Of Life and Lies
by Emerald Olive
Summary: Chronicles the tale of the Dumbledore family: the story of a family, once whole and happy, that was slowly broken apart by vengeance, ambition, love, life, and lies.
1. Prologue: He Was Never Free

**Of Life and Lies**

**by Emerald Olive**

**A/N: This is the story of the Dumbledore Family: Albus, Aberforth, Ariana, Kendra and Percival. A family that was ripped apart by vengeance, ambition, love, life, and lies. Obviously there will be major Deathly Hallows Spoilers, so read at your own risk. Happy reading, and please review!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I do not own the characters, the story, or the world. It all belongs to J.K.Rowling.**

Prologue: He Was Never Free

Those three kids, he had never seen anyone look so downtrodden yet determined at the same time. They were crazy, what did they think they were playing at, trying to sneak into Hogwarts? They had told him that they had been given a _job_. Something _important_, no doubt. Some unreachable aim that had been shoved, cleverly and carefully, into their inexperienced heads by his almighty, all-knowing _brother_.

As he watched them climb through the portrait on top of the mantelpiece he couldn't help but feel as if he was watching them walk to their deaths. It was a morbid thought, it was true. But they were so _young_. His brother had expected so much from them. How could anyone place the weight of the world on the shoulders of three children? What had Albus been thinking? They were just kids. Hadn't he realized that? Hadn't he taken that into account? Hadn't he understood that the loss of three lives _for the greater good_ was the loss of three_ innocent_ lives? No. His brother was always looking ahead, sacrificing the life of today for the life of tomorrow. His brother had never taken innocent lives into account, he thought bitterly.

But had it been only Albus who had risked an innocent life before? No, he answered himself truthfully, with the great familiar twang of guilt. He glanced anxiously at the portrait of Ariana. She had returned to her customary position and was eyeing him knowingly, expectantly.

He walked over to her for what seemed like the thousandth time. His old, wrinkled, veined hands that had once been young and swift gripped the mantel, turning his aged knuckles white. His blue eyes, the same as hers, the same as his brother's, locked with those in the portrait, separated by canvas, but so much more as well.

"Was it I who killed you?" he asked her oil painted face vehemently, earnestly, dying to know the answer which he had always been denied. He waited with bated breath for the consolation which he knew would never come.

She gazed at him with interest through her piercing blue eyes, her young, sweet face displaying the ghost of a smile he had once known so well.

She shook her head slightly, but confidently, her eyes glinting playfully.

But whether her response meant that he had not been the one to cast the fatal blow, or that she was simply refusing to tell him the truth, he would never know.

He sat down, frustrated, on the nearest chair, lost in his labyrinth of thoughts, always colliding with the same memories that had been revisited and relived so many times, traveling in circles, never finding the way out. Would he ever find the exit? Would he ever come to terms with the possibility that it might have been himself who had murdered his own younger sister? Would he ever be free of this guilt that he alone knew? For so long he had been certain that he was the only one that knew this feeling. He had been so sure that he was the solitary man living with this terrible, never ending guilt. But was he?

What was it that the Potter boy had said?

He was never free.

Was that true?

Could that be true?

Had his brother truly and _honestly_ been trapped in the same maze of memories that he himself was imprisoned in?

There had been so many lies. A life of lies, his brother had led. But could this, one pure golden thread in the colossal collection of falsities, be a true and honest reality?

Had the boy spoken the truth?

Had the brothers, who had never shared anything throughout their lives, shared the same guilt, the guilt that ate away your insides, that threatened to burst out of you in spurts of uncontrollable magic or that leaked out slowly through tears?

He would never know.

Never.

He was never free.

This statement, seemingly simple, benign, this statement…this statement changed everything.

Had his brother, his power-hungry, brilliant, forever planning brother really been locked away in the same cell as his own without his knowledge?

Had he been too biased to see the similarity in their conditions? Maybe.

He regretted it now.

Just another thing to regret.

Just another thing to ponder in this prison without a key that he had built for himself.

He was never free.


	2. Chapter 1: What She Knew

**A/N: ****We now proceed to the story...**

Chapter 1: What She Knew

"Mother! Mother!" she heard her precious daughter calling excitedly from the hallway as she knocked on the bedroom door with her small fist.

"Yes, Ariana, dear, what is it you are shouting about?" Kendra replied as she opened the door. Her daughter seemed unfazed by the minor reprimand, but continued smiling, her blue eyes lit up with delight.

"It's Albus, Mum, it's Albus! He's gotten his letter!"

His letter. She had almost forgotten that it would be arriving soon. Almost…but not quite. She had known all along that it _would_ be coming. She had been expecting it. It would have been ridiculous not to expect it. Albus had shown signs of extraordinary magic at a very young age. She knew all along that the letter would come. But nevertheless, she was glad it was here at last. She could finally be at ease. If it hadn't come…well, she wouldn't think about that.

She took her daughter's small hand in her own and, as quickly and swiftly as she could with the small girl in tow, led the way down the steps and into the kitchen. There, a self-important tawny owl was perched on the windowsill and her eldest son was greedily reading a letter, the envelope of which had been furiously ripped and thrown carelessly onto the table, earning him a scorching stare from the official looking owl.

"Look Mum, look! There it is! He's gotten his Hogwarts letter!" Ariana shrieked enthusiastically.

Kendra released the tiny hand of her daughter and walked purposely over to her son, who, being so absorbed in his letter, had not even taken notice of her arrival.

She reached out to give him a kiss on the forehead and he finally became aware of her presence.

"Albus, I'm so proud of you," she stated. And she was. She always had been. It was just this was different. This was a milestone. This was what everything had led up to. This was something that she could brag about to the neighbors.

"Albus, Albus," a blur of long blonde hair streaked in between Kendra and her son, "Albus can I see the letter? Can I? Can I? Please, Albus?"

"No, Ariana. Stop it. It's my letter," Albus retorted as he pulled his letter out of the reach of her eagerly grabbing fists while Kendra sat down at the kitchen table.

"Oh, please Albus? Can't I see it? Please? Mum, can't I see it?"

"Let her see the letter, Albus," she told him indifferently.

"But, _Mum_…"

"What in the name of Merlin is all the commotion down here?" Percival asked interestedly as he stepped into the kitchen, Aberforth following groggily behind him.

Ariana seemed to forget all thoughts of securing Albus's Hogwarts letter as she half ran, half skipped to greet her brother and father. "It's Albus! It's Albus! He's gotten his letter! And it came with that owl over there! I was the first one to see it! It came right in through that window! It has the seal with the 'H' and _everything_…"

"Aberforth, will you _please_ quiet her down," Kendra asked her youngest son pleadingly. Aberforth took the little girl's hand without one look toward his older brother and led her out of the kitchen and into the backyard as she continued to jabber nonstop.

"Now, Albus, this is a very important day in a young man's life," Percival began in a very pompous manner, as if he were talking to the Minister of Magic rather than his eleven-year-old son, "I hope you know that we are both," he put his arm on Kendra's shoulder, "very proud of you."

Kendra smiled her dutiful wife smile. She had had to use it so often that it was programmed into the back of her head and slid onto her face as naturally as if it truly were heartfelt. Albus's happiness flickered; she could see it in his eyes. She was confused for a moment, but then quickly caught herself, and gave Albus a genuine grin. He noticed the switch, and the happiness rose to the surface again, lighting up his eyes that were identical to his brother's and sister's.

"We'll have to celebrate won't we?" she asked him brightly, glad of the opportunity to both make up for her momentary lapse of sincere emotion and spoil him silly at the same time. "We can have all your favorites Albus, anything you like, anything at all. How does that sound?"

Albus smiled slowly, the grin seeping across his face and gradually infecting every last muscle, until his smile was so wide that Kendra was surprised it fit inside the room.

"Wonderful!" Percival exclaimed, "And next week I'll take you to Diagon Alley to buy all of your school things, just the two of us. How about that Albus?"

"Sounds fantastic," Albus nodded enthusiastically. Kendra knew that Albus had been simply dying to visit Diagon Alley to buy all of his school things since the moment he ripped open the envelope that was now lying in a pile of ripped parchment on the table. She'd never even let him near Ollivander's before. He would have grabbed any wand he could get his hands on in order to start practicing. She knew that he was going to be brilliant. He was her son, after all. And he was going to be perfect. No, he was going to be better than perfect. He was going to show everyone how special he was, and do things with a wand that no one had ever seen before. She had always pictured herself taking Albus to buy his first wand. But Kendra also knew that anything, whether time or thought or material, that was given to Albus by Percival, was treasured. Albus adored his father. She knew that would never change.

"Well, then," Kendra said to her husband and son while standing, "We have a lot to do if we're having a celebration tonight!" She gave her son a proud smile, "Albus, could you please go tell Aberforth and Ariana that they will have to help me prepare for tonight, and to have their dinner clothes laid out. Tell them both I want them down here by noon. You can have the whole day to yourself, to do whatever you like; I want everything to be absolutely perfect today for my Hogwarts boy!"

She gave him a kiss on the cheek before he left the kitchen to find his siblings. Kendra turned to Percival who was now reading his son's Hogwarts letter with a beaming smile on his face.

"He's going to be great, you know," Kendra said earnestly, "Our Albus is going to be one of the greatest wizards who ever lived."

And she knew it would be true.


	3. Chapter 2: Approaching Darkness

Chapter 2: Approaching Darkness

Today, everything was perfect. Everything was going to be exactly as he imagined it would be. He was going to Hogwarts. The long awaited letter had finally arrived. And it marked the beginning of the rest of his life.

And he knew just how the rest of his life was going to play out from this point forward. He'd had it all planned since the age of seven. He would go to Hogwarts. He would be in Gryffindor. He would be the top of every subject. He would be a prefect. He would be Head Boy. He would graduate at the top of the class. He would travel and go on the trip abroad to study and learn from the most knowledgeable of wizards and witches. And then, he would become the most powerful and influential and admired wizard in the whole world. It was as simple as that.

And the letter that came today, it would trigger all of those events, creating highlight after highlight of what was sure to be his long, wonderful life. The letter, it was the first domino in a long string of things that were just waiting to happen, and it was falling, falling, falling, and it would continue to fall, in slow motion, until he stepped onto Platform Nine and Three-Quarters, until it hit the next domino.

And everything was going to go according to plan. He just knew it would.

His mother had pulled out all the stops for dinner that night. They had had all of Albus's favorites, peppermint humbugs and treacle tart and everything else he had ever thought was delicious. Ariana and Aberforth had been allowed to leave the table early to play outside, while Albus talked to his parents about his upcoming trip to Diagon Alley. When supper had come to an end, Albus was told by his mother to go and fetch his younger siblings and bring them upstairs to their bedrooms.

It was twilight when he entered the backyard to call in Ariana and Aberforth for bed. The sun had set, but the sky had not darkened yet. The colors that streaked the sky had faded from vivid red and oranges to dusky purples and midnight blues.

"Albus!" Ariana ran toward him, flinging her arms around his neck and looking up into his face adoringly, "Albus, you're going to Hogwarts! Can I see your letter_ now_? Please can I see it? Please?"

"Ariana, give it a rest," Albus told her exasperatedly, as he peeled her hands away from his shoulders a little more forcefully than he should have. She looked somewhat crestfallen at his lack of playfulness, but she soon forgot about it when another thought dawned on her.

"Are you going to get a _wand_, Albus?" Ariana asked him as her crystal blue eyes widened in anticipation.

Albus nodded smugly.

"Father's taking me to Ollivander's next week. On Thursday"

Ariana let out a delighted shriek. She grabbed Albus's hand and before he could react, she dragged him over to where Aberforth was sitting on the grass, staring at the ground while ripping up stray flowers and throwing them behind him aggressively. He was sitting next to a magnificent white marble fountain with four tiers, water spewing lazily from the topmost level. The entire yard was surrounded by a lush, green, perfectly groomed hedge, and the fountain was placed near one of the far corners.

"Aberforth! Albus is getting a wand!" she began, practically screaming with glee and jumping up and down with enthusiasm, "He's getting a wand! He's wanted one for _ages_! He's going next week, Ab, Father's taking him to Ollivander's! On Thursday! Isn't that _exciting_?"

Aberforth merely nodded halfheartedly, contemptuously.

"Aberforth!" Ariana said disappointedly. He didn't respond, only continued uprooting the small flowers growing below the fountain.

"Aberforth!"

Still no response.

"Aberforth?" she asked, bewildered, as she crouched down in order to be at eye level with him, checking to see if he was paying attention. Her long, wavy blonde hair grazed the grass as she craned her neck to get a better look at him.

He glanced up at her moodily, and then continued to stare at the ground once again.

Ariana gave a deep, audible, slightly overdramatic, sigh and returned to her normal height as she turned to face Albus.

"Don't worry about him. He's just jealous because he's too big to fit inside your trunk and I'm not," Ariana said to Albus matter-of-factly.

Albus contemplated her statement for one second before allowing himself to be confused. If Ariana thought that she was coming along…well, she was in for a rude awakening. The last thing he needed was Ariana coming to Hogwarts four years earlier than she needed to.

"Ariana, what are you talking about?" Albus asked her incredulously.

"Well, I'm coming with you, silly!"

"You're not coming with me, Ariana"

"Yes I am Albus!" she said with a smile, "If I'm little enough to fit inside your trunk, why would you leave me at home?" she reasoned with him.

"Ariana, just because _I _got a Hogwarts letter doesn't mean you get to go too," Albus retorted waspishly.

"Come on Albus," she pleaded with him as her eyes welled up with waiting tears, "Hogwarts will be so much fun! I want to go so bad, Albus! Please let me come with you! I'll be good, I swear! I won't get into any trouble and I'll make sure that I'm in Gryffindor like Mummy and Dad, and I'll—"

"Ariana, you aren't coming!" he told her forcefully.

Ariana looked stung as a single tear fell down her cheek.

"Don't you want to take me with you, Albus?" she asked her older brother quietly, with a look on her face that was both puzzled and hurt, her eyes gazing at him unbelievingly.

It was Albus's turn to give a deep, audible, slightly overdramatic sigh.

"Ariana, you have got to _stop_ this, YOU ARE NOT COMING TO HOGWARTS WITH ME!" he yelled at her.

There was an infinitesimal moment of silence in which the light in two pairs of blue eyes was extinguished, snuffed out like the flame of a candle. Albus was breathing heavily, glaring down at his younger sister. Ariana was looking up at her brother, tears running down her face.

"DON'T SHOUT AT HER!" Aberforth had jumped up from his place on the grass and stepped in between his brother and sister.

An icy cold fire rose in two pairs of blue eyes while Ariana took a shallow breath and gave a quaky sniffle from behind Aberforth.

"She can't come with me Aberforth, and you know it."

"She's only _six_, Albus, you didn't have to _shout_ at her."

"She never gives up. She kept on pestering me—"

"She's only six."

"She can't come in my trunk, how would that—"

"Albus, she's only six."

"There's no way. She kept going _on_ and _on_ and _on _and _on_, I had to do something about—"

"You didn't have to shout! She's only six!"

"I KNOW SHE'S ONLY SIX!"

Ariana gave a great, teary sob and another shaky sniffle.

"See, Albus you're doing it again!"

"Doing what?"

"Shouting!"

"What's wrong with shouting?"

"She's only six!"

"So what?"

"So, leave her alone!"

"Why? She's being—"

"You're hurting her feelings, Albus!"

"Well, I didn't _mean_ to, it's just that she never—"

"Just leave her alone, you already made her cry! Don't make it any worse than it already is."

"_I'm not making it any worse than it already is_."

And then the piece of the hedge next to which Aberforth had just been sitting burst into flames.

All three pairs of blue eyes turned to take in the extraordinary sight. For one everlasting second the hedge was engulfed in bright, dancing, red-orange flames, lighting up the darkening sky, and in the next moment the bush imploded, and all that was left between two sides of a charred hedge was a large quantity of falling ash that fell idly to the ground like dry, filthy rainwater.

Ariana began to cry in earnest now.

Aberforth gave Albus a very conspicuous look that plainly conveyed that this was entirely his fault as he turned away and dropped to his knees to try to comfort Ariana.

"BOYS!" their mother's stern voice carried across the yard.

Both boys started as though slapped. Ariana gave a shivery whimper. Albus and Aberforth both looked to the doorway of the house to see the silhouette of their mother, hands on her hips, steam practically emitting from her ears.

"In the house, NOW!" she said sharply.

Albus walked purposely over to their mother, without one look in the direction of either his siblings or the place where the hedge had just been, and fearlessly entered the house as Aberforth got up from his kneeling position and reached for Ariana's outstretched hand.

"Leave Ariana in the yard, Aberforth! I'll have your father put her to bed when he's done clearing the table from dinner. Now, in the house, _right this second_!"

"What were you thinking? Arguing like a bunch of hooligans in the yard. Anyone could have heard you. Or seen you…setting the hedge on fire…honestly…" Aberforth heard his mother muttering as he passed her and gave one last look to the tiny form of the sobbing Ariana alone in the rapidly approaching darkness.


	4. Chapter 3: Fire and Water

**A/N: I would really, really, really appreciate reviews for this chapter. It took me a long time to write, and being one of the most important scenes in the story, I would love to hear everyone's thoughts of my take on it. So happy reading (well...it isn't a very happy chapter, but you get the idea) and please review!**

* * *

Chapter 3: Fire and Water

She hated it when they fought. Albus would start to yell, and then Aberforth would start to yell, and then she would start to cry. That seemed to always be the pattern. But this fight had been different. This time they had been fighting about her.

All she wanted to do was go to Hogwarts. Mummy and Daddy had always told her stories Hogwarts. About the Great Hall, where the ceiling looked just like the sky outside, and during dinnertime you could look up and see all the stars in Heaven, and the secret passageways, where you could enter through a tapestry on the seventh floor and come out through a statue on the third, and the Forbidden Forest, where there were all sorts of interesting creatures, like Centaurs and Hippogriffs and Thestrals…

And after all this time she still wouldn't get to go. Albus was allowed to go. He always got to do everything before she did. All because he was the oldest. Albus got to do everything first. And then after him Aberforth got to do it. And by the time it was her turn, it wasn't even fun anymore. She wished that she was the oldest. Then _she_ would get to do everything first. But she was always last. While she had been helping Mum make dinner Aberforth had told her that she wouldn't get to go to Hogwarts for another _four_ years. That was such a long time from now…

She plopped herself petulantly on the grass next to the marble fountain in the same spot that Aberforth had been sitting before he and Albus had started fighting. The part of the hedge that Albus had accidentally set on fire had been reduced to nothing but a pile of ash, the singed ends framing the view of the small country village below. She picked up one of the bright yellow and white daisies that Aberforth had pulled up out of the ground and left in a disorderly pile. She twirled its long stem between her tiny fingers before she tenderly began to pull off its petals and watch them twist and weave through the air as they fell to the ground, lodging themselves between long blades of tangled grass.

Tears were still running down her face, she didn't seem to be able to hold them back. The moon was visible overhead, and she shivered a bit in the warm nighttime summer breeze as her tears continued to fall along with the startlingly white daisy petals. She could only just hear her father's deep, comforting voice humming in the kitchen as he scrubbed the dinner plates clean and her mother, in a shrill and piercing tone, reprimanding her brothers for arguing and reducing part of the hedge to nothing but dust over the falling water of the fountain and chirping of the crickets in the yard.

But Ariana heard something else drowning out the faint combined sounds of her surroundings and her parents from inside the house. She sat completely still, not moving even one muscle in case her movements caused any unwanted noise, and straining her ears to listen.

It was a group of rowdy older boys. Three of them. She could only faintly see their silhouettes, but she could hear every word they said and every step they made. They were shouting and laughing harshly as she watched their shadows clumsily clamber up the wildly overgrown hill toward the Dumbledore residence.

"Ouch!" one of the boys shouted as Ariana watched him get caught in a bramble. "Ralph, are you sure we're going the right way?"

"Of course I'm sure. This was where the fire came from, wasn't it?" another boy responded defensively.

"Well…He's just saying…there's no sign…of the fire…now" the last boy panted, Ariana could tell that he was the one bringing up the rear. The outline of a short boy had stopped and leaned over with his hands on his knees, as if trying to catch his breath.

"Listen you two," the second boy spoke again, he was the boy that was the farthest up the hill, and as he spoke he turned around to face his two companions, "I'm going to see where that fire came from, and who started it. If you want to quit climbing and miss out on a good adventure, fine. But I'm going with or without you."

"No! We want to come, Ralph!" the first boy shouted desperately as he continued climbing to catch up with his friend, "It's just that…how can you be sure this was where the fire was? Charlie's right, you know, there isn't any sign or a fire here at all. There's no smoke or flames or anything. How do you know it wasn't over on the other side of the hill?"

"Because I just know, Henry! Now you can either be quiet and follow me, or you can go back down the hill to your mummy. It's your choice."

There was silence as the conversation ended and the boys stopped speaking to one another but continued to scramble up the hill. Ariana could hear their irregular footsteps growing closer and closer with every passing second. Soon she could hear them practically feet away. She crawled along the grass strewn with daisy petals to the other side of the fountain, where she could observe the boys without as much of a chance of being seen. She sat with her back against the cold, hard, circular base of the marble fountain, hugging her legs, her head turned sideways so that she could see the opening in the hedge out of the corner of her eye.

There was a long, drawn out silence in which Ariana could see that the three boys were taking in the strange sight of charred hedge, the garden on the opposite side of the yard holding her mother's magical herbs and flowers, and the house itself, but she could hear only the soft tinkling of the water in the fountain, the crickets, and the heavy breathing of the boy called Charlie. They were all so much bigger than she was.

"I thought that there was supposed to be a_ fire_." The boy named Henry, a tall, lanky boy with a mop of mousy brown hair, much older than Albus, and wearing genuine muggle clothing, said to his friend in an accusatory tone.

"But there was a fire!" said the boy who had been panting, Charlie, he was a head shorter than Henry, and fatter as well, "We saw it!" Ariana could tell by his voice that he was still out of breath.

She could see only half of the boy named Ralph, the leader, out of the corner of her eye; his other half was covered in shadow. He was very tall, with a pale complexion. His dark, cold, and insensitive eyes were narrowed, scanning the yard. She turned her head away quickly, hoping that he hadn't seen her. Very slowly and carefully she brought her hand to her face to wipe away the newly shed tears.

"I wonder who put out that fire," the first boy, Henry, said, trying and failing to think up an explanation for the unexplainable, "that couldn't have been put out easily, it was a massive fire."

The leader, the tall boy called Ralph, crouched down in the darkness. He stretched out his hand to the ground and scooped up a handful of ash.

"There's something strange going on here," he said as he spread his fingers and watched the cinders fall through. Ariana heard the light sound of the fine particles making contact with the ground, and it made a shiver run up and down her spine.

She gave a small, involuntary sob.

Three heads turned toward the fountain.

"What was that?" one of the boys asked skeptically.

Ariana's eyes widened with fear as she let out a tiny gasp.

"Someone's over there," another boy responded unbelievingly.

She clapped one of her hands to her mouth; the other hand pulled her legs in even closer, fear gripping her like a rope constricting her body.

"Are you sure, Ralph?" the boy that was out of breath asked.

"Positive," he answered quietly, like predator waiting to pounce on its prey.

Ariana could feel the new tears running down her cheeks and colliding with her hand pressed firmly across her mouth.

"Who do you think it is?" Henry asked in almost a whisper.

There was another silence where all that could be heard was the water spilling over the sides of the white marble fountain.

"A kid?" Charlie asked, almost too softly to be heard.

Ariana heard the heavy footsteps of one of the boys coming toward her. She shut her eyes tightly, trying to block out the scene around her as well as stop her tears from shedding.

The footsteps came to an abrupt halt. She knew what she would see if she dared to open her eyes.

"A girl," the sound of the boy's low voice filled her ears as if the words had been shouted.

"How old?" another boy asked with interest, louder this time.

"Not old enough, that's for sure," Ralph spoke again, still quietly, "Six or seven, I don't know."

There was a disappointed groan.

"What are we going to do about her?" Ralph asked seriously, undisturbed by the moaning of his friends.

There was another long silence, Ariana's eyes still tightly shut, tears leaking out nevertheless, her clammy hand still clamped over her mouth.

"Maybe she knows about the fire?" she heard Charlie ask.

Another silence.

Then a thump.

"No…no…Ralph, don't make me!" the boy pleaded, "You go. You're the one that wants to know about—"

Another shove.

Silence again.

Hesitant footsteps, muffled by the grass, edging ever closer.

"Er…excuse me, little girl?"

Ariana opened her eyes; the tears that she had been holding back spilled over the edge and cascaded down her cheeks. She was practically nose to nose with the boy called Charlie. He had a mysterious, greedy look in his dark brown eyes. Despite being the shortest of the three boys, he was still almost twice the size of her. He scared her. Her hand dropped away from her mouth as she tried to back as far away as possible, only pushing herself farther into the base of the marble fountain, trying to disguise herself in its shadow.

She watched the boy look questioningly over at his companions. She could hear the faint humming of her father in the kitchen. It sounded as if he were miles and miles away from her.

There was an exasperated sigh from behind her and before she knew what was happening Charlie had been pushed aside and the boy called Ralph was crouched in front of her. Through the darkness she could see that his small, dark eyes were black, and as sharp as knives, contrasting greatly with her wide crystal blue ones that seemed to emit a sense of innocence. He was much more frightening than any of the other boys. She tried to retreat even further into her false sanctuary of shadows, but was only met by the cold, hard marble against her back. Another involuntary sob escaped her. Her tears came harder and faster.

The boy surveyed her with interest.

"Did you see who set that hedge on fire?" he asked her in a harsh tone that was dripping in curiosity.

She whimpered as she shook her head, strands of her long blonde hair sticking to her face that was wet with tears.

His eyes narrowed as though he knew that she was lying.

"I—I—I didn't!" she cried.

He raised his eyebrows in a threatening manner. She took a deep, shaky breath.

"Did _you_ set that hedge on fire?" he asked her menacingly.

"N—N—No!" she stuttered.

"Are you _sure_?" he inched closer as he said it.

She nodded her head confidently through her tears, her eyes wider with fright than ever before.

He backed away from her, considering her answer. They were farther apart now, but he never took his eyes off of her as he addressed his friends, "I've heard tell that a bunch of weirdoes live in this house here. Magicians, you know…_witches_."

Ariana shook her head violently, tears dripping off the end of her nose, "I—I'm not a witch. I'm not a w—witch. I'm not a witch…"

"Then how did that bush catch fire, girly?" the boy named Henry joined his friend crouched on the grass.

She didn't answer. Her eyes darted from one boy to the other. Her lip quivered, struggling for words, the taste of her salty tears in her mouth.

"You really don't think…" Charlie began as he crawled closer to his friends, confused, "Surely _she_ can't be…I mean, witches are _dangerous_. She's just a little kid."

"Little kids grow up, Charlie," Ralph said nastily.

The three boys continued to study her warily. Their shameless, unblinking gazes never leaving the trembling form of the little girl attempting to disappear into the shadows beneath the fountain.

"The eyes," Henry breathed.

"What?" Charlie asked fearfully.

"Look at her eyes," he said, louder this time.

They all looked.

By the time she closed them tightly it was too late.

"They're…they're_ unnatural_," Henry said, repulsed.

Ralph, the boy with the eyes like knives, said in a bloodcurdling whisper, "_Witch_."

Ariana shook her head more feverishly, "I—I—I'm not a witch. I'm n—not a witch. I'm not a witch. I'm _not_ a witch."

Then, without warning, the water that had been flowing languorously in the marble fountain erupted like a volcano above their heads.

Four pairs of eyes gazed as though transfixed at the fountain. Mere seconds ago its water had been idly spewing upwards, falling over the tiers, and spilling into the snow white basin at the bottom, but now the water was rising, five, ten feet into the air, with more force than could be possible. _Much_ more force than could ever be possible…

The boy called Charlie scrambled backwards, never taking his eyes off of the fountain, mesmerized by the flow of water climbing steadily higher, "She_ is_ a witch, she_ is_ a witch…" he whispered, more to himself than to anyone around him.

"I'm not! I—I—I'm not a witch! I'm not a witch!"

But the water rose even higher into the air.

"How's she doing that?" asked Henry in a nervous tone of voice, puzzled by the phenomenon occurring before his eyes, "How? How is she doing that?"

All three boys were soaked from the water that was falling like heavy raindrops. A determined looking Ralph got up from the ground and walked over to the fountain. He looked directly upwards. He could see the moon shining serenely, flanked by a hundred stars, through the jet of water shooting straight upwards. Very slowly, he shifted his gaze, down instead of up. The cowering Ariana was looking up at the fountain with disbelief and horror etched across her young, flawless face.

With a swiftness that only a young boy could display, Ralph dropped to his knees and grabbed the tiny body of Ariana around the middle. She struggled, but he was much too strong for her. He covered her mouth with his hand, in case she screamed.

He whispered into her ear, so quietly that no one else could hear, "_Make it stop. Make it stop right now._"

She shook her head, she couldn't make it stop; it was uncontrollable. She didn't even know how she had made it happen. She shut her eyes trying to stop the tears and the scene around her. He was hurting her. She could barely breathe with his hand, half the size of her face, covering her mouth. She kicked and turned her head away, trying as hard as she could to break free of Ralph's strong grip. She was sopping wet from the water that continued to erupt out of the fountain, just as steadily as ever, growing higher and higher as she became even more frightened. Her tears mixed with the water that drenched her hair and face and clothes.

"You little _witch_; you make that stop right now, do you hear? Make it stop! Make it stop, witch!" Ralph whispered to her again. She thrashed about in his grip that refused to relinquish her. He pulled his hand away from her mouth and slapped her across the face. She let out the beginning of what would have been a winded sob before she found his hand clapped against her mouth again.

"Don't you _dare_ make _one sound_," he hissed.

She shook her head again, her eyes still closed. She couldn't do it. His hand pressed harder against her lips. She opened them slightly, and a knuckle found its way into her mouth. She bit down hard, and the hand was withdrawn. She could taste his blood in her mouth.

She gasped for air and shouted as though her life depended on it, still attempting to break free of the arm that was clasped around her stomach, "I'M NOT A WITCH! I'M NOT A WITCH! I'M N—N—NOT A WITCH! I'M NOT A WITCH!"

"Ralph! RALPH!"

"I'M NOT A WITCH! I'M NOT A WITCH!"

"Ralph, drop the freak and _run_, the father's coming!"

"I'M NOT A WITCH! I'M NOT A WITCH! I'M NOT A WITCH!"

The water spurting from the fountain was as high as ever.

"LET GO OF MY DAUGHTER!"

Two boys scampered through the opening in the singed hedge.

"_Let go of her right now, you filthy Muggle_."

"I'M NOT A WITCH! I'M NOT A WITCH!"

Ralph dropped the writhing, sobbing, screaming girl to the ground and hastened after his friends, leaving a trail of blood behind.

Percival bent down and tenderly picked up his daughter. Her small body trembled against his as her arms closed around his neck. "I'm not a witch. I'm not a witch. I'm not a witch…" she whispered, her blue eyes wide. He held her tightly in the darkness. Both father and daughter were drenched in water from the fountain that continued to spew water in every direction from twenty feet in the air. But behind his soaked hair and face, there was fire raging in Percival's eyes as he watched three shadows scurry down the overgrown hill, the scene framed by two ends of a charred hedge.

"I'm not a witch. I'm not a witch. I'm not a witch…"


	5. Chapter 4: Gone

**A/N: New chapter everyone! Thank you all for the wonderful comments on the last chapter, I got four reviews for that one alone! Good job everyone! I'm very proud of you all. I would really appreciate reviews for this chapter as well. I'd really like to hear your reactions to it, and how you think I portrayed all of the Dumbledores. This chapter doesn't lead directly into the next big scene, party because I loathe extremely long chapters, and partly because I wanted to write about the reaction of the family as a whole. Please tell me what you think! Happy reading (again it's not a happy chapter...but you get the idea) and please review. **

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Chapter 4: Gone

Percival ran to the house as calmly and quickly as possible, his daughter shaking uncontrollably in his arms. Both were dripping, Ariana more so than himself. Her long, wavy blonde hair fell heavy and limp, her curls were gone. She was shivering. Her clothes were soaked through. She looked so small and scared and helpless. He held her closer, trying to shield her from the world. But he knew it was too late.

Those three Muggle boys. He had seen them in the village. Always off causing some sort of mischief. But they had gone too far. They had crossed the invisible line between Muggle and Magical vengeance. They would pay.

The last two minutes flashed in his mind in a haze of color and movement and water. He had finished clearing the table and went to the yard to get Ariana and put her to bed. It had seemed like such a long time ago that had happened. She had been out there alone for less than fifteen minutes. Aberforth and Ariana always played outside in the yard after dinner. But tonight had been different. The hedge, which kept the Muggles out and protected the children from harm, this barrier had been broken and burned. When he opened the door the sight was almost too much to comprehend. There was water erupting out of the fountain, a steady jet rising twenty, maybe twenty-five, feet into the air. There was only one explanation for that. Ariana had lost control, just as his son had earlier. But the stream of water extending straight upwards hadn't seemed to be dying down. His gaze shifted from the air to the ground. Two boys. One looking right at him, horror and panic painted across his face. Another looking at something else, unable to tear his eyes away, a mass of struggling limbs on the ground, half hidden in shadow…

Then he heard it.

"I'M NOT A WITCH! I'M NOT A WITCH!"

His daughter's terrified screaming.

He refocused the scene.

Through the steadily falling water he caught a glimpse of bright blue. The light from the house reflecting in his daughter's eyes. He followed her eyes, strands of hair were plastered across her face, her dinner clothes were drenched and heavy, an arm was clasped around her stomach. He followed the arm. Another head, another boy. Pale, with dark eyes, eyes darker than midnight. The boy tried to hold her back, his face distorted with pain, his hand was bleeding.

Percival had started running before he was even aware of making the decision to move his legs.

A blur of shapes and sounds, punctuated with Ariana's screams, like needles that pierced his heart.

He was halfway to her when he shouted.

"LET GO OF MY DAUGHTER!"

He felt, more than he heard or saw, the first two boys run from the scene. The rest of his senses were focused on the struggling heap of child and man on the ground before him. He was so much bigger than she was.

The boy looked up, forgetting Ariana almost entirely. He still did not release her.

Percival was a tall man, with a muscular build and a threatening expression of hostility on his face. Flames of fury rose behind his clear blue eyes, and he knew that the boy would, out of fear, obey anything he said.

"_Let go of her right now, you filthy Muggle_."

The boy dropped her without a second thought. And he ran, dripping blood as he went.

His daughter was screaming, crying, flailing. An innocent bystander to the curiosity of three teenagers.

Carefully, he picked her up. His embrace must have seemed familiar. She accepted without objection. She found refuge in his arms.

She whispered something…nonsense, he couldn't understand it. But maybe that was because all of his being was concentrating on watching those three boys scramble down the overgrown hill through the charred hedge.

Ariana shivered against his body. She was freezing. He turned to go back into the house, a vengeful fire rising in his eyes, his mind still on those three boys.

He was about to step over the threshold when he finally heard what it was she was whispering.

"I'm not a witch. I'm not a witch. I'm not a witch."

He stopped in his tracks.

His daughter had been more excited than Albus was today when the Hogwarts letter had arrived. Why was she now declaring that she wasn't part of the world to which she belonged?

He looked at her, perplexed.

Her blue eyes, an exact copy of his own, they were wide and unseeing, there was no twinkle behind them as there should have been. Unblinkingly, they stared. Eerily, they seemed to bulge, as if trying to escape. They were unsettling. They looked lost.

Something was wrong.

Those blasted boys had done something to her.

She wasn't right.

They were going to pay.

"KENDRA!" he shouted, desperately. He could still hear her voice, carrying down the stairs, shouting at Albus and Aberforth. They hadn't seen anything. They didn't know what was happening.

"KENDRA, COME QUICK, SOMETHING'S WRONG WITH ARIANA, I THINK—"

But there was no need for him to continue. At the mention of her daughter's name, all sound from upstairs had ceased. He heard a door slam and the sound of three sets of footsteps racing down the staircase.

Kendra arrived first, looking harassed, her jet black hair, usually pulled back in a tight bun, was hanging loosely around her shoulders, and her face looked prematurely lined with age she did not have; Albus and Aberforth were at her side within seconds. Her tall, slender body was framed in the doorway as she stopped abruptly, her sons nearly walking right into her.

Her eyes, the darkest green, so dark they would be mistaken for black unless looked at closely, so unlike the crystal blue of her children, found her daughter. The color drained from her face. She could see something was wrong.

"What's the matter?" Aberforth asked fearfully, glancing from his mother to his father, from one terrified face to another.

He couldn't see something had happened.

Nobody answered him.

The only reply to his question was the silence that seemed to last forever.

In reality, in a universe in which the world had not just collapsed, the silence only lasted a few seconds.

Nobody moved.

They were all just staring. Staring at the shell of a girl who had once been so lively. Waiting. Waiting for her eyes to light up again. Waiting for her to give one great sob and pull herself together. Waiting for her smile. But all they saw were those vacant eyes. They were listening. Listening for a laugh, or a giggle. Hoping it would come. But all of that was gone, and the only thing they heard was the steady drip-drop of the water falling from her hair and landing on the floor.

But then they all heard something that brought them out of their stupor.

"I'm not a witch. I'm not a witch. I'm not a witch," she whispered as she closed her eyes to their stares and buried her face in her father's shoulder.

Albus looked startled, taken aback.

Kendra's eyes grew wide, uncomprehending.

Aberforth looked at his sister questioningly, curiously.

Percival sighed, a painful sigh. He held her closer, hoping and praying that he had not just heard what he was sure he had, not wanting to believe his own ears.

Kendra recovered first.

"What was that she said?" she breathed unbelievingly, barely moving her lips.

Ariana obliged unknowingly.

"I'm not a witch. I'm not a witch," she said as she shook her head further into her father's shoulder.

"That's not possible," Kendra strode forward, past her sons, around the kitchen table. Her eyes darted from Ariana, to Percival, back to Ariana, and then finally they rested on the still erupting fountain through the open door to the backyard. She turned to face her husband, "Did she do that?"

He nodded.

"But…" Kendra looked around wildly, as if the answer would magically materialize before her, "But why?"

"There were Muggles. Three of them. Teenagers. Boys," he began, as though in his anger he was unable to string together a sentence, "They came through the hedge. She must have been…I think she got scared. Made the fountain erupt. They…They…They…"

"What?" Kendra asked sharply, eager for answers.

"I think they attacked her. They couldn't stop her doing it. She still can't stop it. She's still scared."

Kendra looked both stern and a little crazed at first. But then she lost her composure. She collapsed onto the table, not bothering with the seats. For a second, she collected her thoughts, her head in her hands, and then she looked up at Percival.

"Give her to me," she told him.

He looked down at his still quivering daughter, then at his determined wife. As carefully and as gently as he could he lifted Ariana up and out of his arms and passed her to Kendra. Ariana struggled to try to find her way back to her father's arms, but stopped when she found her mother's instead. But before she could sink her head into her mother's shoulder, she heard the fountain.

Her head whipped around, her empty eyes finding the steady stream of water rising into the night sky. She whimpered.

But Kendra knew what to do.

"Shhhhh," she hushed her. Kendra turned her daughter's face away from the fountain, kissed her forehead, and guided her head into her shoulder. She pulled Ariana's long, wet hair away from her face and stroked her back. She quieted. The fountain died down, slowly but surely, to its normal pulsing.

All was silent as Kendra stroked her daughter into calmness. And after a long while, that at another moment might have been only a minute, she looked up to her husband, "She's asleep," she whispered.

Percival nodded, but Kendra could tell that his mind was elsewhere. He was gazing out of the door to that led to the backyard, watching the village below through where the hedge had been less than half of an hour ago. He looked angry, worried, frightened. The well known twinkle in his eyes had been replaced by a burning fire. He turned his face away from the scene, as if it was causing him physical agony, and slammed the back door closed with such force that the house shook. Kendra started, and Ariana stirred in her sleep. All eyes darted to the small girl, silently praying for her to remain at peace, asleep, in her mother's arms. Their wish was granted, and she fell back into her serene slumber. Percival brought one hand to his face, the other holding fast to the frame of the door, as though he needed its support to remain standing upright. No one could tell whether he was trying to hide his anger or his tears.

Albus watched his parents from the stairs, Aberforth by his side. They seemed to be intruders on this scene. They were the children. They didn't understand. And for once in his life, Albus didn't want to understand. Something grave had just occurred, and he didn't want to be involved in it any sooner than he was required to. Ariana's eyes…they scared him. He wasn't sure what had happened. He wasn't sure if she would be okay. Those eyes…they seemed haunted, empty, like she wasn't even there anymore.

And what had she been saying before? "I'm not a witch. I'm not a witch." That was it. It didn't make any sense. Just minutes ago she had practically begged him to let her come to Hogwarts. If he had known…If he had known that _that_ would be the next thing he would hear his little sister say…he would have promised her a seat on the Hogwarts Express in a heartbeat.

The whole situation was bizarre. But it was _too_ strange, _too_ peculiar, to be completely harmless. And it scared him.

But what scared him most of all was his father. Albus could tell he was frightened. And this, more than anything else, was what unnerved him. His father was a Gryffindor, through and through, he was brave and courageous. He didn't get scared.

Albus saw, out of the corner of his eye, his mother glance at him and Aberforth, standing at the bottom of the stairs, watching the scene from afar. She looked worried, but relieved, as if she was checking to make sure that their blue eyes had not become empty and vacant as well.

She took a deep breath. Her sons were still unharmed. She looked to her husband for reassurance, "You don't think they'll come back, do you, Percival?"

He turned around at the sound of his name. He hadn't heard a word she had said.

"Do you think they'll come back?" she asked again.

He gave her a searching look, as if thinking, as if deciding what to do. The tiny form of his six year-old daughter, drenched to the skin, was pressed against his wife, sleeping, at peace. But something was still so very wrong. She was hurt, scarred, unbalanced. He looked at his sons, looked at their eyes, the eyes identical to each other, identical to his own. He wouldn't allow it to happen again. He wouldn't allow their eyes to become vacant and lost like hers. He shouldn't have allowed it to happen at all. And now his family, his daughter, would pay for his mistakes. He wouldn't let it happen again.

Those three Muggles, those boys, they had killed her inside. They had murdered his daughter. He would murder them. They would pay.

"They won't be coming back," he said, not to anyone in particular, maybe to his wife, maybe to his daughter, maybe to himself.

He walked across the room and picked up his wand where he had left it near the fireplace, threw on his cloak and moved swiftly over to the back door again. As he opened the door he turned around, this time staring, without a question, directly at his daughter, "They won't be coming back."

And he was gone.


	6. Chapter 5: Vengeance

**A/N: I would like to thank all of my fantastic reviewers. I love you all like you can't even imagine. I'd love your thoughts on this chapter, being that it is the next monumental scene you've all been waiting for. Reviews, as always, will be greeted with everlasting thanks. So happy reading (again...not a happy chapter. I don't think there are going to be many happy chapters in this story, but I'll just keep saying this anyway) and please review!**

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Chapter 5: Vengeance

He ran into the darkness, not knowing exactly where he was going or what he was leaving behind. Too many things had just happened, the world had just crumbled before his eyes at such a fast pace he wasn't even sure what had been reality and what had simply been a figment of his imagination. All he knew was that the cavernous, gaping hole in his chest where his heart had been was entirely real, and he was reminded of it every time he felt its forsaken, empty beating echo inside of his body.

And now he was running, running in an attempt to salvage what remained of his life, of his family, of his daughter.

His mind was congested with swarming images and distant sounds and water, water everywhere. But through all of the ambiguity, one scene stood out clearly: three boys scrambling down the same overgrown hill that he was scrambling down now. And only one word echoed through his head and spread through his veins, down his legs, and to the tips of his fingers in a menacing voice that could have been his own, a voice that was dripping and oozing with hostility. It whispered, "_Vengeance_."

He entered the village, staggering, drunken with anger, his steps unstable and uneven. He would find the boys. He would find them. They would not find him. They would not find his family. They would not find his daughter.

His wand was out, he disregarded all secrecy regulations. He didn't care that he was roaming a town filled with Muggles, or that anyone could be looking. All he cared about was finding those boys.

The moon hung eerily overhead, illuminating the scene, but only just. The soft light left shadows of all sizes, creeping over walls and across cobblestone streets and dancing up and down to the jagged rhythm of his steps. However, the shadows that surrounded him could only be seen by others, for he could not pay attention to such things at the moment. There were more pressing matters to attend to. He must find those boys. They must pay for their actions, for their crimes, for the damage they inflicted upon an innocent child, his innocent child.

He was blindly searching, with his heart rather than with his eyes. Cursing and hexing and jinxing everything that rustled in the darkness. More than once his spells went amiss as a result of his poor aim, he was barely aware of what he was doing.

On and on the streets and roads and alleys seemed to stretch, every crevice posed a threat, every pub was a hiding place, every house a breakable safe haven. And every stray cat was an omen that slinked through his efforts, teasing and mocking him, but urging him forward all the same.

It was midnight.

He still hadn't found them.

He entered an alleyway, the only source of light was the moon, half hidden in the darkness overhead, and a far off streetlamp, flame flickering, dying.

He stood still. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. Eyes darting to every dark and sinister corner. Waiting for them. Waiting for those boys that weren't there. His vengeance still making his blood pump harder and harder and harder. Waiting.

But there wasn't anyone to wait for.

He cursed, a jumble of simple words and complex spells, bellowed every curse he could remember in every direction, not caring who or what he hit, but just anxious to hit something, anxious for his hunt to come to an end. A rainbow myriad of colored jets surged out of his wand, ricocheting off the street and walls and windows, some disappearing amongst the stars.

His search was going nowhere.

He still hadn't found them.

But the vengeance pumping his blood through his body was telling him he could not give up, he must ignore this frustration, he must keep going. Those boys must be punished, and he was the man that was going to do the honors.

So he kept walking, stumbling unsteadily through the streets.

He would not stop.

He would not rest.

He would find those boys.

He would find them if it was the last thing he ever did.

The streets were silent except for the hair-raising echoes of his own footsteps. He peered around every corner, sensing them, waiting for them to appear. He knew they were still out there. He could feel it. He just didn't know where.

Eventually the tangible stillness of the humid summer night was broken by faint heavy breathing. It was coming from a dark passageway that connected two alleys, completely immersed in darkness, a perfect perspective hiding place for three inexperienced, immature boys, unaware of the cleverness and determination of their hunter or of the fate that awaited them.

He inched closer, not daring to break the silence that was his shield, hoping against hope that those three boys could not hear the furious beating of his heart against his chest, or his heavy footsteps that made the otherwise silent and tranquil night quiver and shake with his rage. Everything around him seemed to be illogically out of proportion. Sounds and sights were magnified to ten times what they were. His surroundings were blocked out, opaque darkness on either side of him. The light from the pub down the street was casting irregular shadows, the weak laughs and merriment drowned out entirely by that ominous panting that told him his prey was near.

Closer and closer. One step at a time.

He could hear their whispered conversation now.

"Mad, I tell you."

"What do you expect? His daughter was a witch, wasn't she? He's probably one too, a wizard, you know."

"I wouldn't doubt it. He sure looked like he could be one. He had those same eyes. The creepy ones. Looked like they saw right through you."

There was silence as the three boys considered their last adventure with uneasiness. The fire behind Percival's eyes, invisibly lost in the darkness of the night, rose to the surface again, stronger and deeper than ever before.

"He sure looked angry."

"'Course he was angry, Charlie. We'd only just made his daughter blow up his fountain."

Percival's grip on his wand grew stronger while his other was clenched into a fist. He reached the opening to the narrow passage where he knew the three boys were standing, flat against the wall; he could indistinctly see their silhouettes.

"I hope he doesn't come looking for us. I bet he could do some horrible things. Much worse than blowing up fountains, if you know what I mean."

He couldn't remember saying the words of the spell, or whispering them, or even thinking them, but his wand suddenly emitted a bright light that could have blinded him if he had stared right at it. But he was grateful for the illumination; it had exposed his victims from out of the shadows.

The three boys were right before his eyes. They were panting, slouched against the wall, surprise and fear now painted in every pair of eyes.

At the simple sight of them the gaping hole in his chest imploded and sent tidal waves of fury and purpose and vengeance crashing against the inside of his body, spreading and seeping to his every bone and every muscle. He shivered, a snake of ice slithering up and down his spine.

For a moment they stared at each other, not knowing what to make of one another. But all could sense that the imminent scene would occur because of the fire behind this grown man's eyes, not one of the boys had ever seen vehemence so cold and unforgiving.

Percival was crazed with wrath as he looked upon the sight by the light of his wand. This was the moment, the moment when they would pay for their actions. He had them cornered. He was a grown man, a grown wizard. He had a wand. And they were just three teenagers. They were powerless against him.

"Think you'd go and see what the little freak was up to didn't you? Think you'd see if she could do some pretty tricks for you?" Percival half whispered, half breathed, his voice was scratchy and hoarse as he advanced.

"N—No sir, we just—"

"You're going to listen, and you're going to listen carefully," he began, disregarding one of the boys' attempts to redeem himself, "I don't know what you did to her. I don't care. But whatever it was, you're going to pay for it right now."

"You're mad," one of the boys stated bluntly through his fear, he was backed against the brick wall, eyeing the wand warily and looking as if he wanted to sink into the ground and disappear forever.

Percival and the boy stared at each other, Percival looking at him with estranged interest, and the boy gazing back in horror. He had dark eyes, eyes darker than the night sky above them. He was the one he would torture first.

The boy recovered from his horror before Percival had finished calculating his next move.

"You're a freak. Just like your daughter," he stated brusquely, glaring with apprehension and wonder at the wand in the man's hand.

Percival's expression changed from scheming to menacing, "Is that so boy?"

"What do you think you're going to do with that thing anyway? Blow us all to bits with a stupid stick of wood?"

Percival closed the gap between them. They were now nearly nose to nose.

"You'd be surprised what I can do with this stupid stick of wood," he exhaled threateningly.

"You just want to scare us. You can't do _anything_ with that," the boy said, louder this time, and he spat on the floor between Percival and himself.

And then Percival did something that nobody, not even he himself, could have predicted.

He laughed.

It started as a chuckle, but grew louder and louder until it became full-fledged, high-pitched, cackling, howling, mirthless laughter. It fueled the snake slithering down his back, it fueled the fire in his eyes, it fueled the curses that were queuing themselves up in his mind, one more horrible than the next.

He didn't even know what he was doing as spells and curses of every nature went flying capriciously out of his wand, multicolored jets of light speeding through the air in every direction. All he knew was that these three boys had harmed his daughter, and now, they were being punished.

The boys tried to back away, Percival watched them and their futile attempts, but they were being bombarded by magic that was far beyond their knowledge of what they thought was true about witches and witchcraft. He kept going, Ariana's vacant blue eyes coming to the surface of his haphazard memories every time a spell collided with one of them.

And soon, when his knowledge of spells had failed him, and the three boys were lying, broken, bleeding, or unconscious on the floor, one last spell came to mind, one he hadn't dared to use before.

He looked at the boy with the black eyes, the only one who still had his consciousness. His face was deathly pale, and he was sporting a bloody nose. With his back against the brick wall of the alleyway, he stared at Percival, defiance in his dark midnight eyes, as if daring him to do whatever it was he was thinking of doing.

And that bold look of defiance that was plastered on his face, it made the remnants of Percival's merciless laughter die, and the fire rise again.

Should he kill him?

He should.

But he wouldn't.

He would do something worse.

The worst that could be done, he would do it.

He would make this boy feel the pain he had inflicted upon his daughter, the pain that he had caused his family.

Right now.

But could he do it?

He never had before.

He had never even_ seen_ it done before.

But tonight, with his fury and his vengeance emanating from his body, he knew he could.

He would do it.

His eyes were so dark, black. They repulsed him.

Her eyes, they were empty, clear blue and empty.

"_CRUCIO_!"

He watched him writhe and twist on the floor, gaining a sick pleasure from it. The screams were filling the hole in his chest, the hole that had been created with the screams of his daughter. As the boy screamed and cried, Percival shrieked with him, but in nauseating delight instead of in anguish. Their screams were filling the alley; they were all around him, like a thick mist of pain encircling him, they were traveling up towards the sky, rising to the stars—

And then the boy's screams stopped, just like that, without a warning.

And Percival's cries ceased as well.

Percival looked uncomprehendingly at his prey; he was mercilessly watching the boy with an expression of detestation etched upon his face. How had he done it? How had this mere teenager, now weak and barely crawling, thrown off his curse? The curse had been powerful. How had he done it?

The answer came soon enough.

"Mr. Dumbledore, you are to come with me. You will be taken to Azkaban to await trial."

Percival's head whipped around so fast he pulled a muscle in his neck. There were shadows there, many of them. They were obstructing the opening to the alley he had come from; he could hear the voices carrying from the pub nearby. He hadn't heard them arrive, the sounds of running or Apparating must have been obscured by the screams. He realized now that he had not been as discreet as he should have been about torturing the boys.

"Az—Azkaban?" he asked boldly, not daring to believe what he was hearing.

The man to whom the voice had belonged stepped forward and came into view. There were still shadows of men behind him, half a dozen at least. They were all gazing at him with shock and horror.

The man he could see looked from Percival to the boys lying nearly lifeless on the ground at his feet. He nodded, "I'm afraid so, Mr. Dumbledore."

Azkaban. He was going to Azkaban. The words crashed into him, almost like walking straight into an invisible brick wall. But he didn't deserve to go to Azkaban. He hadn't done anything _wrong_. All he had done was seek vengeance on these boys for their wrongdoings against his family.

"But, please, just wait. I have an explanation. If you would just listen to me—"

"Mr. Dumbledore," said another voice, it came from one of the shadows behind the first man, "What do you think you can possibly say to excuse yourself from performing an Unforgivable Curse on and in front of underage Muggles, in a Muggle populated area?"

These men, they had no idea what they were talking about. They hadn't seen those three boys attacking his daughter, traumatizing her. They hadn't seen her eyes. He raised his wand.

"Please lower you wand Mr. Dumbledore," said another voice from the shadows, it sounded both threatening and threatened at the same time.

Percival didn't move an inch.

"Mr. Dumbledore, your wand," the same voice said again, this time definitely anxious and frightened.

This time he did move, but instead of lowering his wand, he advanced.

"_Expelliarmus_!"

His wand went flying out of his hand and clattered to the ground near the shortest of the three boys, who was now lying unconscious with a deep gash near his swollen left eye.

"Mr. Dumbledore we must take you to Azkaban. You have broken at least three major Wizarding laws tonight; we cannot allow you to walk away from your crimes, the law must be upheld."

The law must be upheld. Is that what this man thought he was doing? Upholding the law? Did the law really have the right to cart an innocent man off to Azkaban simply for seeking revenge against three boys that had torn apart his family? Three boys that had stolen his daughter's sanity?

"Please," Percival whispered beseechingly, "you—you don't understand. I can explain. I can explain…please let me—"

"Mr. Dumbledore, you can tell whatever story suits your fancy at your trial. But right now, you are obliged to come with us," said the man in the front.

The rest of the men came out of the shadows. Some of their faces looked familiar, but he was too shocked to recognize exactly who they were at the moment.

Percival closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He looked at the boys lying on the ground in the dark alleyway. They had been punished for their crimes. And now he was about to be punished for his.

Had it been worth it? Were his actions tonight avenging those boys for their crimes against his daughter worth a sentence in Azkaban?

His daughter's empty blue eyes floated to the surface of his mind for what seemed to be the thousandth time that night.

It had been worth it.

"Someone—Someone must inform my wife…" he told the men resignedly as he allowed them to take him by the arm and Apparate him away.


	7. Chapter 6: Broken Angel

**A/N: This chapter starts out right after Chapter 4 (Gone), in Kendra's POV, so before reading you might want to go back and read the last few paragraphs of Chapter 4. If you want to make my day and put a smile on my face (because smiles during this story seem very hard to come by), please, please review! **

**"Sometimes, even the best of us have to crawl into our mother's arms and cry our hearts out" - My mother**

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Chapter 6: Broken Angel

Gone. Just like that. Without another word the door slammed shut and Percival Dumbledore was gone.

Kendra stared at the door for what she thought was a very long time. She knew her husband, and she knew that when a crisis occurred he did rash and thoughtless things. She prayed that this would not be one of those times, but deep down she knew it already was. He was off to find those boys, she knew it. That's where he had gone, down to the village to hunt them like animals, and there was nothing she could do to stop him.

All she could do was to wait for him to return.

But she could not wait in the kitchen, with her daughter drenched and asleep in her arms and her two sons staring at their surroundings as if they weren't exactly sure of anything that just happened. Kendra couldn't blame them.

She rose from her seat with as little movement as possible, hoisting Ariana into a more secure position as she did so. She walked over to the staircase, where Albus and Aberforth were still standing in the door frame from when they had rushed down the stairs. Everything around her seemed unfamiliar and out of place, almost like she was experiencing all of this in a house that was not her own. It was a strange feeling.

"Mum?" asked her youngest son in a small voice.

"What is it, Aberforth dear?" she whispered in reply, fearful of waking her daughter.

"Will Ariana be alright?"

This was the same question that she had been asking herself as well. She looked at her son. He looked so small and frightened.

"I—I don't know. I just don't know," she began in a hoarse voice. She pulled her daughter closer to her as she felt hot, fresh tears rise behind her eyes. But she wouldn't allow them to fall. She couldn't let her sons think she didn't have the situation under control. She didn't want them to afraid. She changed the subject, "Come on now you two, off to bed with you. It's been a long day."

She followed them up the stairs. She turned left when she reached the top of the staircase into the room she shared with her husband while her two sons turned right and continued on to the room that they shared with each other.

She laid Ariana's wet, sleeping form on the bed as she rummaged through a pile of freshly laundered clothing, looking for anything of Ariana's that she could change her into. She found a small white nightdress that she recognized as the one Ariana would wear to bed night after night, no matter how many times her mother begged her to allow her to wash it. Kendra had stolen it from her daughter's bedroom two days ago, and scrubbed it until it was as clean as she could hope for it to be under the circumstances.

As carefully as possible she peeled off layer after layer of soaked clothing off of her daughter's sleeping body and pulled the tiny nightdress over her head. Her hair was still dripping with water, but Kendra didn't dare attempt to dry it using magic. If she woke up or even caught a glimpse of her mother's wand through her sleepy gaze, she might get scared again, and Kendra didn't want to think about what might happen then. So instead she gathered together her daughter's long blonde mane, tucking away the stray locks of hair that had found themselves plastered across her face or shoulders, and lovingly braided it into one long plait than extended down her back. She had always admired her daughter's long, gorgeous hair, she thought to herself as she gently tamed the remaining wispy curls that surrounded Ariana's flawless, porcelain face like a golden halo.

Kendra thought her daughter looked like a broken angel that night, so small and helpless, and yet haunted by demons. Her face was so fair, her perfect button nose sprinkled with tiny freckles. Her small, delicate frame was rising and falling slowly to the rhythm of her peaceful breathing. But behind those long, golden eyelashes that rested like butterflies upon her face, Kendra knew that the angel had fallen. She had seen what those eyes, the eyes that had once carried the warmth and sunshine and colors of the heavens above, had become. With the twinkle behind them gone they had changed, changed from the color of a glorious sky to the color of a deep sea of mystery and uncertainty; she was lost in the changing winds of the ocean.

But she wouldn't allow herself to cry. She must be in control of her emotions. She could not lose herself; one lost soul was enough for today. One lost soul was enough for forever.

The door of the room slowly creaked open, and Kendra caught a glimpse of dazzling blue. Their eyes were everywhere. She could never escape them.

"Mum?"

It was Aberforth. He poked his head through the crack of the door. He looked so afraid.

"Yes, Aberforth, what's the matter, dear?" she whispered as she continued to stroke Ariana's hair, trying as hard as she could to contain her emotions.

"Can I sleep here with you tonight?" he asked her. He was whispering. He knew to stay quiet; he didn't want to wake his sister.

She looked at him, standing alone, framed in the doorway. He looked very small.

"Of course you can. Come sit right here next to Ariana," she motioned for him to join her on the bed. He scrambled over quickly and nestled himself under the sheets next to his sister.

They were silent for a few minutes while Kendra continued to caress her daughter, stroking her back and face and hair, praying that she would stay peacefully asleep, while Aberforth watched her.

"She looks pretty," Aberforth whispered to his mother from across his sister's sleeping body.

Kendra let herself smile; it was a sad sort of smile, "You're right. She does, doesn't she?"

Aberforth nodded and they were silent again.

"Mum?"

"Yes?"

"Will Ariana be okay?"

Kendra paused before she answered. She sighed and shook her head slightly, "I don't know."

"Mum?"

"Yes?"

"Where's Dad?"

She paused again. She felt her tears creep to the surface again, "I don't know."

"Mum?"

"Yes?"

"I'm scared."

Kendra looked up her son. He was younger than she'd realized, he had always acted older than his age. But now when she looked at him she saw only a little eight year-old boy, frightened and lost, snuggled under the blankets of his mother's bed, eyes wide and fearful.

She stopped stroking Ariana's hair and reached her arm over to Aberforth's face, "I know, dear, I know. We must try to be brave, alright?"

Aberforth nodded again, "I'll try."

There was silence for another minute.

"Mum?"

"Yes?"

"Are you scared too?"

She looked into his eyes; they were Percival's eyes, Ariana's eyes. It was a long time before she answered.

"Yes," she responded as she nodded solemnly. She felt a single tear fall down her face, "Yes I am."

Aberforth took her hand that was still resting on his face. He held it tight in his own and looked at her with a very serious expression on his face, "You must try to be brave."

She smiled as she wiped away her tears with her free hand, "I'll try, Aberforth. I'll try."

She let go of his hand and pulled the blankets higher so that they covered his and Ariana's shoulders. "It's late," she told him softly, "Go to sleep now. I'll be right here, the whole night."

His eyelids fluttered closed almost instantly. He was asleep before he could even whisper "goodnight". She wound her fingers through his auburn locks. He looked just like his sister, Kendra mused, but without the golden hair. He had the same nose, same freckles, same chin, same eyes. She had such beautiful children. All three of them had those eyes, those captivating eyes that she had fallen in love with. When Albus was born she had been so thrilled that he had his father's eyes. She loved those eyes, she did, but at the moment they were making her feel slightly nauseous.

The door creaked again, but it wasn't creaking open, it was creaking closed. Albus had been standing by the door, watching the scene from afar. She could tell by the look on his face that he had been there since Aberforth entered, that he had witnessed her answers to Aberforth's questions. Kendra took a deep breath, "Come over here, Albus," she sighed.

He walked across the room slowly and sat on the edge of the bed next to her. She wrapped him tenderly in her arms. He was getting so big, growing up so fast. He looked up at her, "I thought you and Dad never got scared," he said softy. It wasn't an accusatory tone, more of an expression of his misinterpretation.

"Everyone gets scared sometimes, Albus. It's not a bad thing. It's a part of life. It happens to everybody," she explained to him patiently.

"Even Gryffindors?" he asked her.

She nodded, "Everybody. Even Gryffindors," she said sincerely.

He nestled his head between her neck and her shoulder and for a while, they sat in each other's arms, Kendra holding tightly to her son, her tears threatening to fall at any moment.

Suddenly, a purple jet of light was seen streaking across the night sky through the bedroom window. Both heads turned, startled. There was another, blue this time, then another, purple again, then another, green. Kendra felt her heart drop to someplace in her lower abdomen, making her chest feel strangely empty, as if she wasn't getting enough air. She knew exactly whose wand those sparks were coming from.

She turned her head away, wanting to forget what she had just seen, but Albus, still wrapped in her arms, was watching with bated breath, his clear blue eyes wide, his mouth slightly open.

"Don't look at them, Albus," she said to him. She pulled him closer to her and he turned his head away from the scene as well. Instead he buried it into her shoulder. She closed her eyes and held his head in her hands, pressing him closer to her, letting him cry if he wanted to, rocking him slowly and rhythmically back and forth, like she used to do when he was a baby.

It was a few minutes before she realized that he was crying. She didn't try to get him to stop, she just let him cry. If she had been in his place, she would have started long before he had. But tonight, she had to be the strong one. Tonight, she was the shoulder to cry on. But every tear that fell from her son's clear blue eyes burned a hole through her heart and made her want to scream and weep and beg for a miracle that would stitch their family back together, a miracle that she knew would never come.

After a long time Albus stopped crying. At least she thought so; his body had stopped shaking and heaving with silent sobs. She thought he was asleep, but she couldn't be sure. She held onto him, just in case. She wasn't about to let him go anytime soon, she felt that she needed him as much as he needed her. She felt like she needed to stay right there, huddled together on her bed with her three beautiful, broken children, forever.

But, apparently, fate didn't think so.

She heard a sharp, quick knock on the front door from downstairs. Kendra started, nearly shaking Albus awake. Her nerves were on end tonight. The littlest of surprises were disconcerting her. That knock on the door, it was probably just Percival, she told herself, knocking because he hadn't brought his key with him. That was all. Nothing to worry about.

She carefully disentangled herself from Albus, and laid him down on the bed on the other side of Ariana, his eyes opening groggily through his sleep.

"Albus," she whispered as she pushed his hair out of his face, "there's someone at the door. I'll be back as soon as I can. Just make sure your sister doesn't wake up, alright?"

He nodded as he pressed his head into her pillow, his eyes closed. Kendra kissed his forehead before she walked over to the door and opened it. She crept soundlessly down the stairs, anticipation and apprehension growing higher and higher with every step she took as she approached the front door.

Her fingers closed around the doorknob, the cold metal making her palm sweat. She had a feeling of dread in the pit of her stomach that she couldn't explain. It was twisting and squirming, as if deep down inside her she knew that something was desperately wrong. But nothing was wrong, she told herself again. She was being silly. It was just Percival. He was finally coming home. Everything was going to be alright. Everything was going to go back to normal.

If only that were true.

She opened the door. She had tricked herself into believing that it really would be Percival, that nothing could be wrong, that everything could go back to being exactly as it had been before. But the shocking sight of a man who was undeniably not her husband standing at her door had just confirmed her worst fears. It wasn't Percival. It was the very last person she wanted to see at the moment.

The man's name was Edward Montgomery. Percival had met him when he began working at the Ministry. He and her husband had been friends. Not the best of friends, mind you, but acquaintances, amiable towards each other. He had been over for dinner once or twice a couple of years ago, before Ariana had been born. But Edward Montgomery worked for the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. At the sight of him, she swallowed her pointless prayers and wishes and felt her stomach drop to below her navel just thinking about the reason for his visit. It was well past midnight, and she felt as if she would be sick just standing there when she knew just what was about to come out of this man's mouth.

"Good evening, Mrs. Dumbledore."

She was feeling faint. Her hand was still clasped on the doorknob for support.

"Mr. Montgomery, are you aware that it is nearly one o'clock in the morning?" she asked him in a low voice, realizing as she did so that she was still in her dinner clothes, which were damp from holding Ariana. She was desperate to make any attempt to divert his attention, as well as her own, from the matter which they both knew he was here to discuss.

"Mrs. Dumbledore, I'm here to speak with you about your husband."

Kendra closed her eyes and turned her head away, biting her lip, her hand still holding fast to the doorknob. She hated the way he was speaking to her, as if she was just another person he had to relay pointless information to, and not as if he had known her for years and he was about to tell her something that would forever change her life. She felt the tears creeping up behind her eyes again. But she wouldn't cry. She wouldn't. She had to stay strong for her children, for her family.

"Do you mind if I come inside?" he asked her.

She looked around the hall as if lost. Her eyes found the stairs. Ariana was asleep up there. If anything woke her, Kendra didn't know what she would do.

"Mrs. Dumbledore?" he asked concernedly. She must have been silent for too long.

She looked up at him, shaking herself out of her stupor.

"Do you mind if I speak to you inside? Maybe you would like to sit down?"

She leaned heavily on the doorknob, making the door swing slightly, but she caught herself just before falling, "No…No, we can't speak inside. My—My children, they're asleep…they're asleep upstairs. I—I don't want to wake them."

Mr. Montgomery nodded, "I understand," he whispered. "But if you would prefer not to speak inside, I must insist that I speak to you outside. It is of the utmost importance."

She nodded in reply, a grimace sneaking its way across her face. She felt like she was walking to her death as she stepped outside and closed the front door behind her.

"Mrs. Dumbledore, I regret to inform you that your husband has been taken to Azkaban."

Kendra felt her heart stop. It didn't drop to her stomach, or rise to her throat, or feel unnaturally large, or start beating at twice its normal rate, it just stopped. She felt as if she had just fallen off a cliff, perpetually falling, falling, falling, never hitting the ground.

"You see," he continued, apparently interpreting her silence as confusion, "We found him down in the village, torturing three Muggle boys in an alleyway."

She didn't say a word. Shock and nausea swept her body. All she wanted was for him to stop talking.

"He was using the Cruciatus Curse on them. We had to take him, Mrs. Dumbledore, we had to. It was a major violation of the Statute of Secrecy, performing spells, especially an Unforgivable, on Muggles, in an area that was simply swarming with them. We had to take him."

She still didn't say anything. Her husband was in Azkaban. She was alone, alone with young three children, one going off to Hogwarts in a month, one traumatized and unstable. And Percival…he was in Azkaban. Azkaban. It was such an ugly sounding word. It made her think of terrible things, like darkness and ice and unforgiving smiles. She really thought she might faint now, she was feeling dizzy. Either that or she was about vomit all over the porch.

She closed her eyes and tried to steady herself. She held her tears back and held herself upright. She would not lose her composure. She wouldn't. Absolutely not.

She felt him as he approached her. She knew that he was going to pretend to comfort her now. He was going to pretend to care. She wouldn't allow herself to be tricked again, not by him, not by anyone, not even by herself. She opened her eyes to see him very close to her, a look of pity in his eyes. She didn't need his pity. She wasn't going to cry.

She took a deep breath, "Thank you, Mr. Montgomery. You may leave now."

She felt her tears rise to the surface again, threatening to fall, fall, fall, and never stop falling.

"Mrs. Dumbledore, I—"

"Please just go."

He didn't move.

"Go! Please go! Go, go, go! Please," she begged him, "just go."

And with one more fleeting look into her eyes, he left. He left her standing on her front porch, alone, with three children asleep upstairs, a husband in Azkaban, and tears dangling precariously from the corners of her eyes. Things just kept getting worse and worse.

Her shaking hand opened the door and she entered the hall. There was a mirror on the wall to her left, it was dingy and dirty, but it was a mirror all the same. It had belonged to Percival's uncle or great-uncle or uncle's great-uncle, something like that. She wasn't exactly sure what it did, it might have been just a regular mirror. But they kept it in the house, just the same. It hung over a table where Kendra placed pictures of her children and family, to impress the visitors when they walked in.

She had never really taken all that much notice of the mirror before today. But as she walked past she noticed that the woman in the mirror was not somebody she recognized. It was her. Or was it? She didn't remember ever looking like that, with dark circles under her bloodshot eyes, and premature wrinkles covering her face. She looked like someone much older, someone who had been through so much more than any woman her age should ever experience. But it had been a long day. Tomorrow would be better. That's all she could deceive herself into thinking.

Her gaze shifted from the stranger in the mirror to the photographs that lined the table. There was one of the five of them standing outside of the house, they had just moved in. She was holding Ariana and Percival was standing next to her, a beaming smile on his face, his eyes alight and twinkling even through the aged black and white picture, Albus and Aberforth arm in arm, their eyes twinkling the exact same way. Next to that one, there was another, this one of only Percival and Ariana, two years ago on her birthday fifth birthday. Their eyes were precisely the same color, the same cloudless heaven shade of blue. She had her arms thrown around his neck and both were smiling. When would be the next time she would see those smiles? She didn't know. That scared her. It scared her more than anything else in the world.

When would she see her husband again, and see those eyes twinkle again like they used to? When would she see her daughter's face light up like before, with her eyes glittering in the light of her smile? She didn't know. She just didn't know.

She made her way over to the kitchen table, legs unsteady and hands grasping anything they could reach to get her there safely. She collapsed into a chair at the table, grateful for its sturdiness. She put her elbows on the table and rested her head in her hands. Her world was steadily falling apart.

And with her eyes covered by her palms she began to cry. She cried and she cried and she cried. Her hot, wet tears mixing with the sweat of her palms. It was too much to cope with. She couldn't stay strong forever. She couldn't go on like this. So she kept crying. She cried well into the night, for hours, until she could see the light creeping across the kitchen from the sun rising over the hill. She cried for her daughter and her husband and her sons, for those blue eyes that she both loved and hated, for broken families and broken angels, she cried for it all. She cried until she couldn't even remember what she was crying for. And then, as the first sliver of a blood red sun rose to greet the village, she drifted off to sleep, her head resting atop the wooden table littered with her own tears.


	8. Chapter 7: Facade of Perfection

**A/N: Sorry for the delay in updates, school staring has been crazy. But here we have the next chapter! Reviews will be greeted with everlasting thanks and love from me. Put a smile on my face, you won't regret it, I promise. So please review my darlings, I simply love hearing from you. **

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Chapter 7: Façade of Perfection

Albus was sitting on the stairs. Watching. Just watching.

It was still fairly dark outside. The sun would be coming up any minute though, he could tell by indistinct hues that streaked the morning sky.

He had been sitting there watching for a while now.

He hadn't been able to sleep for very long.

He was watching.

But he wasn't watching the sunrise.

Watching the sunrise would be a spectacle instilled with hope and beauty.

Instead, he was watching a scene in which hope and beauty were not known, a sight filled with such heartbreaking emotion, it was hard to stop yourself from getting caught up in it.

He was watching his mother cry, entranced by her ever-flowing tears.

He had never seen anyone cry like that.

It made him want to sit down next to her and weep along with her.

She was crying as if it was all she could do, as if there was nothing else left to do in the world but to cry.

And maybe, Albus thought to himself, maybe she was right. Maybe everything really had gotten out of hand. Maybe nothing ever would be the same again. Maybe everything was falling apart. Maybe there was nothing left to do but cry.

But mothers were always supposed to fix everything. Mothers were always supposed to know everything, from how to mend a broken bone to how to bake a cake. Mothers were supposed to be able to sew everything back together, whether it be a ripped pair of pants or a broken family, they were always supposed to know how to put everything back together.

But as Albus watched his mother, broken down and crying at the kitchen table in the soft light of near morning, his previous misconceptions were shattered. He realized that mothers were just people. They were people just like everyone else. And they couldn't fix everything.

He realized that nobody in the world, not mothers, not fathers, not professors, not even the most powerful wizards and witches of the world, could make everything perfect. Nothing is ever perfect, no matter how much it seems to be on the surface. Superficial perfection is nothing more than a simple lie.

And then, he realized that superficial perfection was exactly what his family had been hiding behind before this moment, before the façade that portrayed the perfect family had cracked and crumbled, leaving nothing but tears and lies and memories of false happiness in its wake. Now, the Dumbledore family was just another broken family, they were one of many, not special or privileged, just ordinary. Maybe even less than ordinary.

And in that moment, watching his mother cry before the approaching sunrise, Albus Dumbledore grew up. In that fleeting instant, his innocence was lost, and he was no longer a child, but an adult. Very few of us have a defining moment that signifies the end of our childhood and the beginning of our understanding of the world. Usually it occurs slowly, over time. But if you are unlucky enough to experience a moment such as this one at a young age, you will know that it will be something that you will never forget. It is a moment of revelation when the whole world as you thought it was is turned inside out and upside down and around and around and around, and everything that was true is false and everything that was false is true. And as Albus watched his mother cry and drift slowly off to sleep, and as the first sliver of crimson sun materialized upon the horizon, he was experiencing a revelation of shocking similarity to the one just described.

He knew now that nothing would ever be the same again.

He knew now that nothing would ever be perfect.

He knew now that nothing had ever been perfect.

Perfect.

It was nothing but a lie.

ooo

It was well past noon by the time that Kendra awoke from her slumber. Disoriented, she lifted her head from the kitchen table. Her back was stiff and her shoulders and neck ached. What was she doing sleeping at the kitchen table again? She rubbed her eyes; she could tell they were puffy and bloodshot. She remembered. She had been crying. The events of last night flooded her brain and she scrambled up from the table, realizing by the brightness of the room that it was already late into the day. She walked a few paces, headed for the stairs, but her vision became blurred and she lost her balance. She felt around for anything to steady herself before she got the opportunity to faint to the floor. With her eyes closed, her hand found the wall. She wilted into it, grateful for its sturdiness. Why did it seem that everything around her was spinning out of control?

Because everything really was spinning out of control, she reminded herself.

Things were coming back into focus. The kitchen was a mess. She should have known that trusting Percival with the cleaning had been a bad idea.

Percival.

He was in Azkaban.

The feelings of dizziness and nausea swept over her yet again.

She thought that she might be shivering a little as well now.

She needed to pull herself together. Things couldn't go on like this. She couldn't keep falling apart at every possible moment, feeling like she needed to cry or vomit or faint whenever things took a turn for the worse. She needed to stay strong, for her husband, for her children, for herself. Just because her family was broken, just because she was broken, didn't mean she couldn't act like everything was still whole and intact, as if nothing had changed.

But it had.

Everything had changed.

Percival's arrest wouldn't be swept under the rug, not with his major breach of the Statute of Secrecy in such a blatant manner. There was no hiding from it. The news would be everywhere.

But people would want answers. And then what would Percival say? If he said anything about Ariana, she would be carted off to St. Mungo's the very next minute. And Kendra couldn't let that happen. The thought alone was simply preposterous; she would never let her daughter be taken away from her, especially now. She was just a child. It didn't matter if she was unstable, or if something was wrong with her, she was just a child. She needed her mother, not Healers or a hospital. She wasn't going to St. Mungo's.

She was still propped up against the wall when she heard a voice from upstairs, barely, faintly, but a voice nonetheless. Her head turned toward the staircase and her eyes darted to what she could see of the landing. Nothing.

But she could hear it now. Ariana, muttering and mumbling through her sleep the words which Kendra had been so frightened of, "I'm not a witch…I'm not a witch…I'm not a…"

Her eyes narrowed with uneasiness. The mumbling had stopped. Kendra made another silent wish for her to keep sleeping for just a little longer, and after that long sleep she would wake up and everything would be back to normal. Her daughter wouldn't be scared, and she would be just as perfect as she always had been, running around, laughing, her eyes lighting up…

But her eyes were empty. Kendra remembered now. Her eyes were haunting images, like two snuffed out candles, lost in darkness, shrouded in mystery.

It wouldn't be long now before she would see those eyes again. Sooner or later, Ariana would have to wake up. And when she did, Kendra knew, deep down in the pit of her stomach, her eyes would still look lost.

ooo

That day, Ariana slept through the entire afternoon. Kendra had been beginning to wonder whether she would ever wake up. She would go into the room and check on her, when she wasn't just sitting there watching her, to make sure she was still breathing. She didn't know what she should expect, and in her mindless cleaning of the house, she would go up and down the stairs, sometimes three times, or more, just to check on Ariana. She would go up, watch her, then go down, then up again, just to make sure, then down again, then up once more, just in case, then down. She would have been at it all day if it wasn't for Albus and Aberforth prodding her along. She was beginning to wonder if they had changed overnight, becoming adults, realizing the magnitude of the situation. Albus was being especially mature about things; Aberforth merely seemed to be following his lead. Kendra didn't know what had caused this miraculous transformation, but she was grateful for it all the same. Neither of them had asked about Percival; she figured that Albus must have heard something going on downstairs the night before, and told Aberforth not to ask any questions. Though, she hoped he hadn't seen anything. She didn't know what she would do or say if Albus confessed to her that he had seen her crying.

She hoped he didn't know about his father either. He was an intelligent boy. He could put two and two together, and she knew that he must have realized that Percival wasn't coming home any time soon. She didn't feel quite up to explaining the circumstances of their father's incarceration to two very young boys, not now at least. She would have to tell them sometime, but now she just needed to focus on her daughter. She needed to make sure that she would be alright, that she would be safe. And so, she kept drifting up and down the stairs…

ooo

It was dinnertime and Ariana still hadn't woken up yet. Kendra was becoming very uncomfortable and anxious. Ariana had been sleeping for _hours_ longer than she should have been. She just wanted her to wake up. But did she? Did she really want her to wake up and have to see those empty eyes again? She didn't know what she wanted. She wanted her family back, her perfect family. But she couldn't have that. She could never have that again. Had she ever even had it to begin with? Had it ever been real? Or had it always been an act, a performance, a game of pretend, a façade of perfection? She didn't know. She just didn't know. She didn't know anything anymore.

They were eating leftovers for dinner. She hadn't had the time or the energy to cook another meal, and there was still plenty left over from the celebration for Albus yesterday. Had it really been only yesterday that the Hogwarts letter had come? She had almost forgotten about it in the rush of life changing events.

Yesterday she had been so excited and proud that Albus was going to Hogwarts. And now, she wasn't sure if she wanted him to leave anymore. She knew she shouldn't feel that way; he had to go to Hogwarts. But she wasn't ready for him to leave her yet. She hated the thought of losing another child. It seemed that everyone around her was slowly disappearing, leaving her alone to handle situations she simply _couldn't_ handle alone.

They were all sitting together at the table, Aberforth being unusually quiet, and Albus not looking at anyone. Kendra was watching them, but not with her full attention. A part of her mind was still upstairs with Ariana, and another part was contemplating how much the two boys could know about Percival.

They ate in silence. All that could be heard were the clink of forks against plates and the sparse sounds of muffled chewing. Only three sat at the table today. Yesterday there had been five. Two places were empty tonight. It gave the normally warm and familiar kitchen a feeling of abandonment and despondency.

Kendra could hardly stomach anything more than a few bites. Her dinner was sitting in front of her, cold and barely touched. Albus was just staring at his plate; he hadn't even picked up his fork yet. Aberforth was playing with his food, not eating any of it. Under normal circumstances Kendra would have reprimanded him. Tonight she didn't have the heart, or the energy.

So they just sat there, pretending to eat, pretending to be a family. Last night had changed them all, and now it was almost as if three strangers were sitting together at the table, not looking at one another, not knowing what to do.

Suddenly and unexpectedly, a large owl flew in through the open window. Kendra started and dropped her fork to the floor with a clatter. The owl turned around in mid-flight and on its way back out of the window dropped the _Evening Prophet_ on the kitchen table, right in between Albus and Aberforth.

Kendra's eyes widened as her gaze found the headline. She lunged across the table, forgetting all appropriate behaviors and table manners, and snatched it away. But the damage had been done. Aberforth looked as if he was going to start crying at any second, gazing at Albus for some sort of explanation. But Albus looked as if he had been carved out of stone; he sat perfectly still, continuing to stare at his untouched dinner.

She held the paper close to her, as if by taking away and hiding the visual representative, the whole affair would cease to exist. She stood up from the table slowly, still holding the paper against her chest, careful to make sure that not even one more word of that article found its way to the eyes of her sons. She turned around, hoping they wouldn't see her and that she wouldn't see them. She knew that she couldn't look at their faces anymore unless she wanted to spend another night alone in the kitchen, weeping until she ran out of tears. But though her face was turned away, their expressions seemed to be imprinted on the insides of her eyelids, Aberforth's face dripping in surprise and unbelief, Albus's totally unreadable. They didn't need this. They hadn't done anything. She had to protect them. They were still so young. And if protecting them meant withholding information, so be it. She wouldn't let them see it. Not now. Not ever.

"Albus…Aberforth…" she began. She didn't seem to be able to get her words out. She wanted to be left alone to read that article, to inspect the damage.

"Alright Mum," she heard Albus say. Aberforth must have followed Albus because she heard two sets of footsteps ascending the stairs.

"Boys…" she turned to see their backs halfway up the staircase. Two heads whipped around to look at her.

"Your sister…"

Albus nodded, took Aberforth's hand and steered him to the right on the landing, leading him to their room, leaving their sister sleeping in peace.

Kendra took a deep breath. She didn't know how much more of this she could stand.

She gripped the newspaper tightly in her hands. This paper, it would ruin her, she just knew it. She had seen the headline, clear as day, the image flashed in her mind, the black and white letters seeming to jump off of the page, even through her memory, big and bold and thick. They read, she could recite by heart already: Percival Dumbledore Tortures Muggles. She didn't even have to look at it to know what the rest of the article said. Her husband had been torturing them for pleasure. That's what it would say. Pureblood Muggle torturing, that's what the idiotic Prophet would put it down too. They didn't know anything. They didn't know about her situation, about her family, about her daughter. But yet they would slander and gossip and accuse and ridicule. Anything for a story.

What did it matter if a family was demolished, when in the long run, they sold more papers? What did it matter if her husband was in jail? What did it matter that her daughter had lost her sanity? It didn't matter. Not to them.

She felt a tear slip down her cheek. She didn't deserve this. Her family didn't deserve this.

She looked down at the paper, but at once she wished she hadn't. There was a photo along with the headline. Percival, his blue eyes lost in the darkness of the alleyway, three vague shapes, the boys. More bold letters. Trial date: Thursday, July 29. Cruciatus Curse. Midnight. Three innocent muggles. The phrases jumped out at her as if leaping off the page.

Another tear fell.

She wouldn't let it happen.

But it was too late.

She tore the paper in half, right down the middle. Then again, and again and again. She was viciously ripping and ripping and ripping, stray pieces falling idly to the floor. It was a load of lies, that paper. She ripped Percival's photo in half. With one article, they had destroyed her family. She ripped apart the headline. They had knocked down her façade of perfection with one single blow. She was shredding the paper to bits and she didn't even care, it didn't matter anymore anyway. The damage was done. Now, she just had to live with it.

Kendra's last tear fell as she heard Ariana's quiet cries from upstairs.


	9. Chapter 8: Almost Midnight

**Author's Note: So, yes, I know that I am a terrible person. And, yes, I know that it has been over four months since I updated this story. There have been ten thousand things going on in my life on top of a severe case of writer's block and three different drafts of this chapter. I hadn't written anything for a while, but the other day I went shopping, and though this may seem completely irrevelant, bought a fabulous pair of jeans. They are gorgeous, and fit me perfectly. When I went to put them on that night to go out, I noticed that there were green olives on the inside fabric of the jeans. So, I said to myself, this must be some sort of sign, and I think it might be time to go back to being Emerald Olive for a while. So finally, the next chapter is here. Hope you enjoy it! **

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Chapter 8: Almost Midnight

The room was darkened, pulsing, almost glowing, but not quite. It seemed as if a heavy purple curtain, almost black, had been draped around the once familiar room, transforming it into the mysterious unknown. Kendra bravely opened the door further, feeling that she had just opened the forbidden, locked portal of a sinister and unvisited land. Or maybe it wasn't a portal at all. Maybe it was something different, something less alluring. Maybe she had just opened a Pandora's Box of some kind, finally allowing the hardship and troubles that she had so long been ignoring to flood her mind, her home, and her family. Was she subconsciously surrendering her fight against the inevitable? Or maybe she was just letting her imagination get the better of her. But even if she was, the situation that stood before her was more elaborate and ominous than any she could have ever imagined, even in her wildest fantasies.

Her daughter, her fair and beautiful Ariana, was fitfully tossing and turning, crying and whimpering. Kendra could only see pieces of her through the mass of tangled bedclothes. A lock of golden hair, a tiny foot, the crook of an elbow, all illuminated as a result of their harsh contrast to the dark shadows and overwhelming sorrow that shrouded the room. The night sky had changed the atmosphere of the room, and there was a different aura surrounding her daughter than there had been at any previous time of day. The darkness seemed to magnify the magnitude of the situation by a hundredfold. And Kendra yearned to physically touch Ariana, to work her motherly magic, to make everything better. But it wouldn't be better. All she could do was to temporarily ease the tears.

She slid into the room noiselessly, holding her breath, feeling as though she was entering the sick room of a dying person. She hated that feeling. She hated that she was feeling that feeling. She hated that she was in a situation where she was feeling that horrible feeling.

Each low whimper coming from her tiny daughter made her heart rise further and further until Kendra was nearly gagging on its presence in her windpipe. Why was life so unfair to the innocent?

She reached the side of the bed without realizing that she had moved from her place at the door. She used to understand everything that entered that pretty head that was tossing and turning so restlessly. Now Ariana was a mystery, an enigma too complex to piece together or to pull apart.

Kendra's misguided thoughts flew through her crowded mind at lightning speed; what if…there were so many what ifs. And each was more frightening than the one before. What if Ariana wouldn't even recognize her own mother? What if she would forget her father, who had sacrificed everything for her? What if her eyes never returned to that exact shade of blue that they had been before, the exact shade of the afternoon sky? What if…what if everyone found out about what had happened to Ariana, what if they thought she was mad, insane, delusional. What if the neighbors came calling, wanting to see the children, wanting to see Ariana, with those expressions full of pity, and sympathy, and false understanding? What if Ariana was taken away? What if she was taken from her family, forced to remain at St. Mungo's where she would be alone and small and scared?

It couldn't happen. Kendra wouldn't allow it.

But how? How could she prevent it? How could she fight the inevitable? She had been trying too hard to fight destiny. Maybe now she should just let things happen the way they were meant to happen.

But what if the way that things were meant to happen were not the way that Kendra wanted them to happen? What then? Could she allow her daughter to be taken from her? Would she? No. Absolutely not. Could she allow herself to live with the misery of a broken family, with a delusional daughter locked away in a hospital, and a husband locked away in a prison, and fragment of the broken family locked away in a dark, gloomy house, for the rest of her life? She couldn't. She wouldn't. But was there any way to stop all this from happening?

At Percival's trial the truth would come out. He would have to explain his actions on that night…and then what would happen? If he told the truth, Ariana would surely be taken away. It would be the price of his freedom, to come to a family with a vital piece missing, leaving an aching, gaping hole. But if he lied, if he told some fabricated tale of drunken exploits or foolish provocation, it was his life on the line. It was his daughter's freedom for his own.

It was a choice, a decision that would be cursed with negative consequences no matter what conclusion was reached. There was no way to bring her happy family back together. Kendra realized it now. But which conclusion was better? Was there a better choice? Or would both leave her wishing she had chosen the other? Either way she would lose someone. But if she could decide, who would she choose to lose? Was there any way for the present situation to be erased into nothingness, forgotten and lost, so that she could be transported back to the past with her husband and her daughter and her sons, where they would live happily ever after?

Happily ever after was a childhood dream, a dream that never comes true. Ariana loved stories of happily ever after. Of princesses, and beautiful enchantresses, who fall in love and marry the handsome wizard, of evil witches, and ignorant Muggles, who are punished for their actions and crimes. But was happily ever after even possible any more? In Ariana's mind, happily ever after had always been possible. But not anymore.

No. She would have no happily ever after.

But which ever after could she choose? Which ever after would she choose? Which ever after would be happiest, which the most devastating?

The answer was simple. Both endings would be devastating. There was no way around it, no escape from the inevitable, looming, and devastating future.

There was a choice to make. But was the choice even hers? Was there a way to decide the outcome instead of merely allowing it to unfold on its own?

Maybe.

But if she could…would she? If there was a way to decide, a way to choose her fate, would she take it?

Fate was a funny thing, she mused, as she watched her restlessly sleeping daughter. It always knew what was ahead, what was to come. It knew the decisions you would make, and the consequences of those decisions, even before you knew them yourself. Did fate know her decision already? Did fate know the consequences she would live with?

That idea made Kendra feel very strangely and suddenly claustrophobic. It made her feel as if she was not free to choose. It made her feel as if her decision had already been made for her, but she could not know what it was.

Could you change your fate? Or did fate change along with you? Was fate an ever-changing path that shifted with your choices, or a straight one that you followed blindly?

Kendra didn't know.

But she knew which she preferred.

If fate was changing, then maybe, just maybe, she could still alter her direction, her family's direction, on the path of fate.

Ariana's breathing had returned to normal. She had stopped thrashing about, and was laying still, her small chest rising and falling steadily. The house was quiet. The neighbors had not yet begun to call.

There was still hope.

And maybe there was still time.

Kendra snapped out of her trance. She had time. Not much, but some. And she knew, or at least she thought she knew, what she had to do with it.

She approached the sleeping Ariana, her fair face angelic and helpless. Kendra was her mother, her protector. If either her daughter or her husband had to be sacrificed, Kendra knew who it would have to be.

She placed a soft kiss on Ariana's forehead, and slowly backed out of the room. Kendra flew down the stairs, careful her quick footsteps were not heard by any of the children. She rummaged through the cloak stand in the hall trying to find her traveling cloak, but they had all been stored away for the summer.

There wasn't time to find it. She threw Percival's heavy black traveling cloak with the silver fastenings around her shoulders. It was too big for her frame, the hood came down past her eyes, and the cold fabric made her skin, warm from summertime, shiver. But it didn't matter. He had worn it to work the other day, when he had needed to make a trip to Azkaban. It still smelled of him, and though the fabric was cold and cumbersome, knowing that just the other day Percival had worn this very cloak made Kendra feel warmer and more confident in what she was about to do. But then again…he _had_ worn it, but he had worn it to _Azkaban_.

The very thought of Azkaban made the tiny hairs on Kendra's arms stand on end. It made her think of screams and darkness and shadows, and it also made her feel strangely hopeful and hopeless at the same time. But she had to face her fears. No matter how scared she felt or how futile this pursuit seemed, she was going to Azkaban.

ooo

She slid out the front door like a black cat into the night. The sky was dark and heavy with fog, the stars were invisible and the moonlight was stretched to unrealistic proportions. Midnight had not yet arrived, but it loomed eerily in the distance, quickly approaching.

She had to act with speed and agility, there was not much time. Her wand was held tightly in her hand, and as she stepped over the invisible boundary that separated the Dumbledore house from the rest of the world, she felt the ancient magic that protected the house clink into action. Percival's parents, when they had lived in the house before they had died, had made sure that their home had every possible protection. Kendra trusted their magic. Her children were safe for now.

Her thoughts shifted back to Ariana and Percival.

She glided soundlessly down the lane, hidden in shadow.

There was still time to alter fate.

She turned a corner.

Ariana would be safe.

She quickened her step.

The choice was still hers to make.

Her eyes darted to something else moving in the shadows.

She was getting closer.

Only a cat.

The power was hers.

If only nothing stood in her way.

ooo

Edward Montgomery sat alone in his sitting room with a steaming cup of very strong tea in hand. It had been a hectic day at the Ministry. Wizards and witches from all departments had been bustling in and out of his office all day, wanting confirmation of the seemingly ridiculous rumors about Percival Dumbledore that were buzzing about. It had pained him to tell the truth, but the Daily Prophet was going to twist the facts no matter how many people knew the real story. And it was better for people to know the actual truth than it was for people to know the Prophet's idea of the truth.

The house was quiet. His wife was upstairs, sound asleep. She had wanted to wait for him before she went to bed, but he had resisted. He had needed to sort out his thoughts, alone, drinking his cup of strong tea, in his favorite chair next to the fireplace in his clean and tidy sitting room. His mind had been spinning ever since last night. The whole world seemed to have turned upside down and inside out with unanswered questions.

The suspected motives for Dumbledore's attacks, they just didn't seem to fit with the story. Or maybe they did fit the story, but they just did not fit the man. There had been ceaseless speculation from the second they had received the notice. Why Dumbledore? Why these Muggles? Why the use of Unforgivable curses? Why last night and not the night before, or the night before that?

The rest of the wizards in his department didn't seem to think that these were relevant questions. They accepted the circumstances, however odd or unsettling they may be. They were more interested in the trial, in how long his sentence was bound to be, in how strong the memory charms were that had been placed on the Muggles. Only one of his colleagues had asked him about Kendra. One. And it hadn't actually even been a question, more of a sympathetic remark.

"How horrible for his wife," his colleague had said, shaking his head. That had been all. How horrible.

But what about Kendra? What would become of her? What would become of the children?

And why, why, why, why, why had this happened?

Muggle torture. That's what most had pinned it down to. It wasn't so uncommon, after all. There had been a few cases in the past couple of months, wizards torturing Muggles for sport. Everybody in his department had been expecting another case to show up soon, it had been a while since the last one. That's what everyone thought Dumbledore had been doing. That's what it had certainly looked like. But was it really? Were they jumping to conclusions? He knew Dumbledore; he had known him for a long time. Could he believe that Percival Dumbledore would just leave his home, his wife, and his children to go down to the village and torture three seemingly innocent Muggle teenage boys?

Maybe.

Who knew anymore?

Who was he, Edward Montgomery, to judge what was truth and what was lies?

Who was anyone for that matter?

He could only rely on what he himself had seen. At least he thought so. And what he had seen when he had arrested Percival Dumbledore was not a man filled with cold-hearted malice or ruthlessness who had tortured just for the sake of torture. He had seen a man with a purpose, whatever it may have been. A cruel and unforgiving purpose, yes, but a purpose all the same.

But maybe (because who really knew anymore?) he hadn't really seen that at all.

ooo

Her destination lurked just out of sight, hidden in the same shadows that disguised her figure, but at last she came upon it.

It was a small cottage, modest, well cared for, surrounded by tall, trimmed evergreens, and shrouded in the indistinct darkness of near midnight.

Did she really want to do this? Was it worth whatever shame or humiliation or failure might result? But then again, was it worth the slim chance that whatever was left of her family would be salvaged?

She walked quickly and lightly up the walk, barely making a sound, her husband's long black cloak ghosting over the short, even blades of immaculately cut, dewy summer grass.

ooo

A soft knock at the door brought Edward Montgomery back to the surface of reality.

He glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece. Almost midnight.

He hadn't realized how late it had gotten.

Who would be calling at this hour?

He got up and placed his cup of tea, which had grown slightly cold and undrinkable in his moments of contemplation, on the table next to the armchair he had been sitting in. He had a feeling in the pit of his stomach that whoever was at his front door at this time of the night was not someone that he would be glad to see.

When he opened the front door, he was taken aback by the sight of the mysterious hooded figure, cloaked in black. The eerie fog and shadows of midnight were steadily rising, like tendrils of steam, and wrapping themselves around the evergreens in the misty cold of a summer night that threatened a storm. At first glance, they seemed the perfect surroundings for this sinister figure.

He meant to say something, to ask some sort of question about the identity or intention of this person, but before he could the figure's hand emerged, a woman's hand, pale and thin with long fingers. The hand was brought upwards and Edward watched, as if time was barely moving, as the hand of the figure slowly lowered its hood.

He should have known, was his first thought when he caught a glimpse of Kendra Dumbledore from under the shadows of the cloak. But when the hood had been fully lowered, and he was able to look at Kendra's face full on, his second thought was that something within Kendra Dumbledore had changed. He could see that this was not the same woman he had known all those years ago.

Her black eyes seemed sunken and cowering, and there were dark shadows under her eyes that mirrored the shadows of midnight around her. Her face was pale and thin, thinner than he remembered from the night before; it gave her skin the look of being pulled taut around her already distinctly defined features. The warm, flickering firelight from the house did not give her the illusion beauty as it did to others, but rather made her seem small and colorless, her small frame lost in the impeccable black of a cloak much too large for her, and her eyes, nose, lips, and chin lost in shades of gray shadows.

"Mr. Montgomery," she whispered the greeting softly in a hoarse voice that cracked as if it hadn't been used in days, trying to maintain some sort of cordiality while attempting to hide the awkwardness and embarrassment of the situation.

For a fraction of a second he wasn't sure how he should respond. But his confusion quickly subsided and he answered in what he assumed was a smooth tone, "Kendra."

At the sound of her name, Edward Montgomery watched as Kendra's eyes lifted from their position fixed on the floor and locked with his own. Her eyes were pleading, desperate. But there was also understanding etched into the premature lines of her face. In that fleeting glance in which both knew the other could be the key to the truth, they understood each other. He understood her position, her fear, her anxiety. She understood that he had no choice but to take away her husband, that he did not know the real truth. He understood that she knew the truth, whatever that truth may be. She understood that he would not ask her for the truth, but would only accept it if she was willing to tell.

The moment of unspoken understanding only came to an end when Kendra softly uttered: "Edward?"

He looked at her questioningly, ready and willing to help her in any way that he could.

"Take me to Azkaban."


	10. Chapter 9: Azkaban

**A/N: So, it's been a while. But, the next chapter is finally here. Of course, reviews are always appreciated and greeted with everlasting thanks. Enjoy!**

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Chapter 9: Azkaban

He had known it was coming, but he was shocked by her answer nonetheless.

It was a lot to ask.

"Azkaban?" he asked, knowing that his unwillingness would mean nothing against her determination.

"Azkaban," She answered, sure of every syllable.

"When?"

"Now."

"Now?"

"Now."

"But, it's midnight."

"Now."

His understanding of her situation started to flicker. An unauthorized trip to Azkaban at midnight with the wife of a prisoner was more than enough to lose him his comfortable job at the Ministry.

But then again…if this was that important to her, if this was a matter of life or death, of eternal happiness or eternal misery, who was he, Edward Montgomery, to see it for what it really was?

The answer was that he had no right to judge her situation.

He did not know the truth.

The ability to judge another soul, he concluded to himself, was an ability that all blind humans assumed that they possessed, but an ability that all humans with open eyes and open hearts realized was impossible to ever truly possess.

But Azkaban? _Azkaban_? At _midnight_?

It was a lot to ask.

"Could we maybe…" he began, hoping to postpone this huge breach of Ministry law, "I could get authorization….in the morning—"

"Please, Edward. It has to be now."

"Why?"

"No one can know about this."

Oh. Nobody could know. This was going to be very difficult. This would make losing his job so much easier. And why? Why? Why could nobody know about this? Why was this trip so highly important?

But really, did he even have a right to ask?

Did he have the right to wonder, even?

No.

"I'll need five minutes…" he mumbled, more to himself than to Kendra, but Kendra's eyes smiled. It was awkward to watch her smile like that, only her eyes and nothing more, almost like eavesdropping on a conversation. It was like that smile that never quite reached her lips was private and intimate, like it was something that he shouldn't have seen.

They both glanced away from each other at the same time. But before Edward could look back, Kendra had slinked into the shadows like a starving, neglected black cat into the bushes at midnight.

ooo

They walked silently, their long shadows almost, but not quite, disappearing in the dark, fighting and losing to the fog. Neither spoke a single word. The only sound that could be heard was the faint rhythm of footsteps on the ground, two sets of footsteps, one heavy and one light, both nearly nothing, alternating, like a heartbeat.

She blindly followed him.

She wanted to be in control. She wanted to have the upper hand. Could she trust him? Could she? She thought so. But how could she be sure?

She couldn't be sure.

But she would have to trust him.

So she followed him.

She didn't like following him. It made her feel secondary. Like she wasn't quite sure of the plan. Like she was just an accomplice, just a minor character.

If only that were the case.

Her mind was a zigzagging line darting in all directions in the silence. Often it would dart to Albus and Aberforth, and sometimes also to the frozen fortress of Azkaban, but it was constantly zipping back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, between Percival and Ariana.

She had made her choice.

But was it the right choice?

There was no way to know.

She could only tell herself that the only right choice is making a choice at all.

Not that that was very comforting.

What if she had chosen wrong?

Maybe she had chosen right for today, but wrong for tomorrow. Or maybe wrong for today, but right for tomorrow. There was no way to know. It was so frustrating and frightening all at the same time.

She shivered. Her eyes swept from the ground to the shadowed fraction of Edward's face ahead of her.

He was already looking at her.

His face was old, she observed. Lines. Lots of lines. He looked older than he was.

Her face probably looked like that now, too. It probably looked older than his. That reminded her of Ariana. And Percival. And Aberforth. And Albus. And the future. And all the reasons why her face was now old.

But he was still looking at her. With his old face, he was looking at her sideways.

She raised her eyebrows.

"It'll be soon now," he whispered, the sounds barely escaping his lips, getting caught in the foggy moisture of the midnight air.

She didn't respond.

But she kept following.

ooo

The air closed in on her, like drowning, like falling, like suffocating. The pressure. The heat. The cold.

It was cold.

Suddenly, very, very cold.

She opened her eyes.

It was still dark, but the cold was biting. It stung her eyes like knives. She could feel it through the cloak, through her skin, through her bones. It whipped through her. Like she was nothing. The dark was welcoming at first, enveloping, but it was too dark. The kind of dark where it is impossible to know for sure if your eyes are opened or closed. A different dark. New. And dangerous.

And there was something else besides the darkness. Noise. Sounds. Rhythm.

Water.

She could hear it rising and falling, reaching the shore, stretching, and then receding, back into the sea. She could hear it, and feel it. It sounded beautiful. It felt beautiful. But there were less beautiful things that needed to be felt.

She felt a tugging on her arm. She let it take her. Like the sea.

She lost her footing, and then she was part of it. The sea. Swaying upwards and backwards. And sideways as well.

But it wasn't as easy as it seemed.

She grabbed hold of something she could only sense and could not see, wood, splintering, old and hard.

She could sense the boat around her, small, confined. She could feel Edward's warm breath, could sense his fear, could hear his lungs fill up with cold air and release, louder than the sea waves.

Maybe she wasn't as afraid as she thought she was. Maybe she was actually being brave.

But she felt far away. Very far away.

And cold.

ooo

The boat ride was treacherous. The freezing air combined with the freezing water danced around the tiny boat. The journey seemed to go on forever, stretching endlessly into the freezing, black sea. The only comfort was that for every second of biting cold and icy water, she was one second closer.

One second closer to Percival.

One second closer to her choice.

One second closer to her fate.

ooo

The cold of Azkaban was deafening. It was so much more intense than any cold she had ever felt. It surrounded her, licking her cheeks and ears like razors. But, it was also so much more than that. She could feel it inside of her. It penetrated her skin and imprisoned her heart and lungs. It was more than just a sensory cold. It was a cold that made it impossible to remember warmth. It whistled and whispered an eerie cacophony that ran through her body and made her shiver and chatter with each screeching note.

The fortress was larger than she imagined it, but no less foreboding. The prison rose over her head like a misplaced cliff in the center of the sea. It was black, the same color as the water, the same color as the sky. Near the base, where the stone should have been eroded from the wear of the sea's waves, the building was pristine and surreal. Not one barnacle or any other sign of weakness. It made it seem that much more indestructible.

The wind whipped her husband's cloak around Kendra's comparatively small frame. She held it closer to her chest, trying in vain to block out the cold.

And then, through the blackness, she saw them.

Tall and faceless, two Dementors were guarding what must be the entrance. Their rotting hands seemed to be eerily beckoning her closer, eager for new prey.

Seeing them made her frozen cold insides churn.

More than once, her mind nearly slipped, falling into the events of the last few days. But she had to hold on. She could not lose herself to the presence of the Dementors.

She had to change her fate.

For Ariana. For her family. For herself.

She would not lose her grip on her sanity.

But, it got harder and harder as the little boat came closer and closer to the guards.

But, at the same time, it got easier and easier.

She was so near to Percival.

She wanted so much to see him, hold him, touch him in every way possible, maybe for the last time.

The boat stopped advancing about twenty feet from where the Dementors stood. It continued to bob up and down with the sea, but did not go any closer.

"It's a back entrance," Edward whispered.

Kendra nodded, not looking at him, her eyes locked on the two Dementors hovering inches above the stormy sea.

"Very secretive," Edward continued, "Not many know about it. Not even most of the people that work in my department at the Ministry. They won't track your visit if you enter here."

Kendra nodded again.

There was a faint sound, almost like a pulley system of ancient metal chains, which seemed to originate from deep below the crashing waves. The sound became louder as the sea began to tremble beneath the boat, and then, from the depths of the water, came a deep shadow that rose steadily as the volume of the clinking increased. When the shadow finally broke the surface, the sound stopped abruptly.

It was a dock, constructed of rotting wood that reminded her of the rotting hands of the Dementors. The dock was covered in barnacles and seaweed, looking somewhat like a sunken ship, and contrasting greatly with the smooth, black, flawless building that was Azkaban.

Edward clamored out first, leaving Kendra alone in the swaying boat. When he finally gained his footing on the uneven, rotting dock, he extended his hand to her. She reached for it, grasping it tightly. She wasn't sure that she would have been able to stand without his support.

Together they made their way, carefully and cautiously, across the wet, slippery, corroded dock, closer to the Dementors, and Percival, with every shaky step.

The Dementors were taller than she had imagined. Towering above her, their height made their powers even more daunting. The closer she came, the emptier and more tortured she felt. She wanted to run from them, but Percival…Percival was what made her continue on.

"She's here to see Percival Dumbledore, the newest prisoner," Edward addressed them in a voice that only presented itself as calm and collected. Kendra could hear the masked fear as clear as daylight. She wondered if the Dementors could as well.

Their faceless faces shifted towards her infinitesimally, considering her. She felt their impossible stares throughout her entire body. She felt empty, yet her insides revolted against the cold with each passing second.

One of the Dementors, the one to her left, slowly raised its scabbed, rotting hand, and curled its long fingers, silently asking her to advance.

It turned around, disappearing through the hard, stone wall, leaving the other Dementor to stand guard.

"Go on," Edward said to her quietly, "I shall wait here."

She followed.

As she stepped through the wall she could feel its burning warmth around her, like molten lava. But it was over much too quickly, and the frozen air collided with her even harder, suffocating her, making her body tighten dangerously, as if it was trying to squeeze itself into nonexistence.

The hallway she had entered was austere. Dark and harsh looking, with no escape for the icy air. Percival's cloak seemed so thin and flimsy, like nothing, the way the cold penetrated it in this confined space. The only small solace was the absence of the wind. But, despite that, Kendra's eyes began to sting and water. She could barely move her numb fingers. Her heartbeat seemed so far away and frail.

The Dementor beckoned her forward once again.

She walked slightly behind it, afraid to come too close.

Her footsteps echoed around her. Only one set of footsteps, alone and ominous. The towering Dementor next to her made no sound as it glided along, eerie and unnatural.

There was a sharp turn and the hallway became even darker around her. She followed the shadows, long and haunting.

Down a stone spiral staircase, wide and sweeping, the stone showing no signs of wear, as if it had never been used before.

The wide staircase led to another hallway, narrow this time, with a ceiling so low that the Dementor beside Kendra had to stoop down to move across it. They continued down the hallway for a long time, passing empty cells on each side, each seeming to be miles away from the one before and the one after.

The narrow hallway came to a fork, and Kendra followed the Dementor down the hallway to the left. The ceiling was higher here, but the hallway even narrower. There were no prison cells. The floor sloped downward, and as the pair continued down the hall, the ceiling seemed to get higher and higher.

A sharp right, into another hallway that looked almost like a tunnel. It smelled like a putrid mixture of saltwater and decay. The walls were a slippery black color and mysteriously wet, and water steadily dripped from up above. The tunnel was so silent that when each drop hit the floor, Kendra could hear the sound of its echoes explode around her. The echoes of her footsteps clashed ferociously with the echoes of the dripping water. Her breathing quickened.

She was close.

She could feel him.

Her heart wanted to lurch out of her body and start galloping ahead of her, running toward him. Percival was here.

The Dementor stopped in front of a set of slick, slippery, rusting metal bars that extended from the floor to the ceiling. Kendra could hear the creature's rattling breath. The bars slid open slowly at the Dementor's command, clanking like the same ancient pulley system that had brought the rotting dock to the surface of the sea.

When the bars came to a stop, Kendra slid into the cell without a signal from the Dementor.

Percival was crouched on the floor, his back against the slimy black walls, staring at her with his wide blue eyes, uncomprehending. The gleam was gone. His eyes were flat and cracked, searching. The same as her daughter's. Lost. His mouth was a straight line, so different from the smile that she was so accustomed to. He looked frightening when he wasn't smiling. His hair seemed darker, not quite auburn, and streaked with strands of gray she hadn't noticed before.

Had Azkaban done all that to him in such a short amount of time?

Kendra was still hidden in the shadows of the cell, withdrawn, the hood of Percival's cloak masking her face further in shadow.

The bars of the cell began to close with that same screeching metal sound, leaving her alone with her husband. She felt the Dementor retreat. It was out of her sight, but not far. She could still feel it.

She looked back at Percival, confused and huddled alone in this dark, damp, icy place. The sight of him, her husband, her lover, here, made it so much harder.

"Percival," she whispered, longing etched in every syllable.

His eyes changed. They softened. There was a shadow of a sparkle.

He smiled.

"Kendra," he responded, his voice raspy from disuse, but so full of beauty and hope it was barely contained.

At the sound of his voice saying her name, Kendra's heart erupted with fire. She took a step closer and dropped to her knees. Her icy fingertips reached out to stroke his frozen cheek. Despite the cold, she could feel the fire between them. She wanted to touch every part of him. Her heart wanted to be close to his. She wanted to be able to hear the rhythm of their two hearts as one.

His shaking hand reached up to lift away the cloak's hood. He managed to wrench her hair free from the knot she always wore it in as they moved closer together. Her long, dark hair fell in waves down her back.

They were nose to nose. She could smell him. Feel every part of him. Take in each different shade of blue in his eyes.

She wanted him more than ever before.

He was supposed to be hers.

They were supposed to be one.

She could feel it in his kiss. Their sameness. Connected in so many ways, physically and spiritually and so many others. It was right.

Her hands grasped at his chest as his lost themselves in her hair. She wanted to experience him with every sense she possessed.

One last time.

But there wasn't enough time.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

She could hear the echoing drops of water falling from the ceiling. Time. Oh, time, please stop. Only a few moments.

But the echoes continued.

With all the willpower she possessed she pulled herself free of his lips. She looked at him. Looked at every feature with blood pumping furiously through her veins. Both her hands found his face, rough with the beginnings of a beard. How old they both were. When had that happened?

She looked in his eyes. Those eyes. They were the reason she was here. She had seen too many pairs of empty blue eyes.

"Percival, you must listen to me."

His hands were still intertwined in her hair.

"Anything, Kendra. Anything for you."

"You might get angry."

"Never."

"Please, Percival. Please…" she began, pleading in whispers.

"Kendra," he said, his eyes serious and set.

She paused, listening to the steady dripping.

"You must tell them you tortured the muggles for sport."

His eyes widened, and his voice was a harsh whisper, "Why would I do that, Kendra? Why would I leave you like that? Why—"

"Because they could take Ariana away!" she breathed in desperation.

Percival blinked, he stroked her hair, "They wouldn't do that Kendra. Why would they—"

"Because she's gone, Percival! She's traumatized and I think…I think…"

Percival's hand locked onto her jaw, not fiercely, but with concern, "Kendra, tell me."

"Percival, they'd take you anyway. The newspapers, and…just tell them that you did it for sport Percival, please, please, please—"

"Kendra," he said, "Why should I tell them that? Why?"

Kendra paused as she considered him.

"Because I think she's lost her sanity, Percival. I…I _know_ that she has. I can _feel_ it. They could take her to St. Mungo's! We could never see her again…"

Percival's eyes had drifted in thought.

That would…it would…it…" Kendra began.

Kendra's grasp tightened on Percival's face until his eyes found hers again.

"That would kill me, Percival."

They looked at each other for a long time.

Percival's voice shook as he said, "I'll be here forever, Kendra, forever. Until I die."

A tear escaped her eye. It fell slowly down her cheek. Percival pulled her closer and with a touch of his thumb wiped it away.

"You can't let them take her away from me, Percival, you can't, you can't, you can't…"

"Kendra," he said to her, holding her face with his strong hands.

"Please, Percival, please, please, please…"

"Kendra, I won't let them."

Kendra buried her face in his neck, smelling his scent, kissing him, memorizing the planes and contours of every part of him. He seemed to be doing the same. She was crying and smiling and kissing and breathing and feeling her heart beat along with his.

But.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

Together, as one, they felt the Dementor inch closer. Kendra whipped her head around to watch it approach the bars. Again, with the sound of ancient, screeching metal, sounding so much more jarring now.

The doors slid open.

Time was up.

And with one last tender kiss between husband and wife, she was gone, pulling the hood of his cloak over her head, masking herself in shadows once more, leaving only the echoes of her quick footsteps mixed with the incessant, steady dripping.

Drip. Drip. Drip.


	11. Chapter 10: Life and Lies

**A/N: Hey everyone. New update. I'm really going to try to update more regularly. No promises, but I'm going to try really, really, really hard. That's all I can give you. I know I've got a lot of great reviewers, so I'd like to say thanks to all of you, and to everyone else who has read this story. Thanks for your time! I'm working very hard to keep the story going for you )**

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Chapter 10: Life and Lies

He thought he must be underwater. So deep and dark. Cold. And wet.

There were no windows, so there was no way to tell for sure…no way to tell if it was night or day, summer or winter. Nothing.

He was alone.

Just his own imagination.

And the steady

Drip. Drip. Drip.

of the water.

It was unendurable. How long had he been here? There was no way to measure aside from the slowly, steadily ticking drops. And really, how reliable were they? He could have been here hours, days, months, maybe even years. How long had it been between the time he had arrived and the time of Kendra's visit? A week, maybe? Maybe less. Maybe more. It had felt like a week. He hadn't slept nearly enough, if it had been a week. It had probably been less, then. Maybe two days. Maybe one. And how long had it been since she left? An eternity, surely. Or maybe a few minutes, an hour, a day.

But, when she had been there with him, the cell didn't seem dark, or small, or wet, or cold. It had felt like home.

And now, without her, it felt like ice. Cold and shivery, slippery wet.

His whole body felt numb. Frozen straight through the core. In so many ways.

Somewhere, just close to the surface of his skin, he could still feel the phantom touch of her fire. The warmth wanted to seep down deeper, envelope him…but it was resisted by some mysterious force that resided within him. Some unfathomable, perverse want to be numb. And he couldn't understand it. Because he shouldn't want to feel like this. He should want to escape in the remnants of her freezing warm touch. He shouldn't want to be numb.

But, at the same time, even though he shouldn't, he did want it.

Why?

Because he wanted to forget. Forget how to feel. Forget how warm Kendra's touch had been, even though they were both freezing and blue. Forget what happened to his body when he saw her, when he touched her. Forget how beautiful she was. Forget how to love her. Forget his family, his children. Forget Ariana. Forget her empty blue eyes. His own empty blue eyes…

He shut his eyes, flinching at the thought that his daughter's were no longer the only pair of blue eyes that were empty.

He shouldn't want to forget.

He shouldn't want to forget the woman he loved. He shouldn't want to forget his family.

Why did he want to?

Because it would hurt too much if he remembered.

He had thought that love was something unbreakable. And maybe it was. Maybe it wasn't. Or maybe there were just some things that were stronger than love.

He loved Kendra, didn't he? Of course he did. He still loved her. He could never stop loving her. But did she love him? She did. This he knew. They had loved each other so forcefully, so passionately…blindly. Love is blind. They were blind to the outside world. Their love had collided with disaster. A disaster they had been blind to. And now what? Was it still love? Or was it just blind trust?

He still loved her so much.

They were still so young.

Thirty-two.

Was that all?

They were still too young.

Too young for this.

Too young for everything.

What were they thinking?

They thought they were in love, that's what.

But what was love, really? When does it start? When does it end? Does it ever?

He didn't want to know.

He just wanted to be numb.

But he hadn't chosen to feel this way. It had been forced upon him, hadn't it? Kendra had made the decision, so there wasn't any decision left for him to make. Was there?

He didn't think so.

But, could he blame her? Could he blame her for having the courage to make a decision at all? For a having the courage that he did not have?

And, if he had had the courage to make a decision, which would he have made? Truth or lies?

Kendra had chosen lies.

But what would he have chosen?

Truth?

It seemed like the right thing to choose didn't it? The truth? But was it, really? Truly? The truth would only tear his family apart even more. Exposing what truly happened would, in turn, expose them. And what if Kendra was right? What if they did take Ariana away? What would that do to him, to Kendra, to their family?

Kendra had told him what it would do.

It would kill her.

It would kill him, too.

And he knew her well enough to know that she was speaking the truth.

So, he would choose lies?

Lies would be the only solution, would they not? To keep them safe. To keep her safe.

But it shouldn't be that way. The truth should be the solution, not lies. The truth was supposed to be the single thing that one could always fall back on. The truth could never change. Lies could change. Lies could break. Lies could laugh and turn and disappear. Couldn't they?

But now the world did not agree. Day and night were one for him. Summer and winter were one eternal season. So, truth and lies must be the same as well.

When did true become false and false become true?

He didn't know.

But it had happened.

And now he was here forever, pondering the same question.

For the rest of his life.

But, was it even life anymore? Or just existence?

He was breathing. And he could feel, despite the fact that he didn't want to. But, was he really still _alive_?

And, really, what did it matter if he was alive or dead, or just existing? Maybe, like day and night, and summer and winter, and truth and lies, alive and dead had become one as well.

Because he was alive. But he wasn't _alive_. How can one truly be alive if he has nothing to live for? So maybe he wasn't dead. But he most certainly was not _alive_.

He didn't have Kendra. And he didn't have Ariana. Or Albus. Or Aberforth. He didn't have his family. He didn't have his dignity. He barely even had himself.

So, why keep fighting? Why not surrender?

Because maybe, maybe, maybe, somewhere out there, outside these dripping, underwater walls, someone was living for him. What would Kendra do if he were to surrender? And what would Albus think, Albus who was going to Hogwarts, who was going to become a great wizard just like he'd always wanted?

Albus would think he was a coward.

A cowardly Gryffindor.

Another opposite that the world had turned around to be compatible.

But isn't that what he had become? He was sitting in a cell in Azkaban, alone except for the soul-less Dementors and the ominous, eerie dripping water. He was a coward.

But maybe he didn't have to be.

Maybe there was a way to save himself, to save the people he loved, to prove that he was not a coward, even if the only person who ever knew it was his eldest son.

All he had to do was make a decision, a decision that would save everything he had lived for.

And maybe he could do that, not through the truth, but through lies.

Because truth and lies were really the same thing.

Weren't they?


	12. Chapter 11: Two Lost Oceans

**A/N: Hey everyone! An update! I'm trying to stick to my word about the updates here ). So, let me know what you think of this chapter, I adore reviews. Really, I do. They make my day. And thanks for reading, everyone. You're all awesome.**

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Chapter 11: Two Lost Oceans

A light rain was falling outside, making the dirt below lose its resistance to her weight as she slipped from shadow to shadow. The night was still dark and intertwined with fog, but the sky was a different kind of dark now. Somehow, it was brighter than before. It could have been the sun gradually, barely, moving, unseen, closer and closer to the horizon. Or it could have been the perceptible discrepancy between the blackness of Azkaban and the deep, deep navy, freckled with squinting stars beyond the fog, of the heavens as seen from Mould-on-the-Wold. Kendra didn't care to find out. The heat of the night air was overpowering, so different from Azkaban.

She was aching to finally reach home. She sprinted the last few paces to the door, letting Percival's cloak billow behind her, praying for any breeze at all to sweep past her sweating body, wanting to tear the cloak away from her bare skin, but also never wanting to part with it.

The air in the house was warmer than the air outside. She carefully peeled the cloak off of her. The heavy material had felt like nothing but thin gauze wrapped precariously around her such a short time ago. Now it weighed her down, heavy and dripping from the combination of sea mist and sweat.

Her long, dark hair was still out of its usual knot. It was wind whipped and wild, but she could still feel the way Percival's hands had been tangled up in it. She didn't ever want that throbbing tingling on her scalp to ever go away. But even as she thought about it, it faded. It was just a memory now. Percival was her past. He wasn't any part of her future.

The house was dark. She climbed the stairs with her memory rather than her sight, trying to make as little noise as possible. But she halted before she had reached the fourth step. Her ears caught the feeble whimpering coming from her bedroom, from where Ariana was sleeping. She took the rest of the steps two at a time in the darkness and wrenched open the door when she reached the landing.

The room was just as she'd left it, but different now. The atmosphere had changed. It was no longer dreary, but now seemed somehow cluttered and stuffy. Albus was the first one she saw. He was sitting on the floor at the base of the bed, his head against the mattress and his eyes closed in sleep. He reminded her of a guard sleeping on the job. The shadows of the dark room caressed his smooth, young face, highlighting his features. He had been through so much. And there was still so many more burdens that he would bear. He was so young. He didn't deserve this. None of them had deserved this.

Ariana and Aberforth were on the bed in the center of the sea of tangled sheets. Ariana was crying into Aberforth's shoulder, her tiny shoulders shaking. Aberforth looked up at her, blue eyes glinting in the darkness. Kendra couldn't look into those eyes. They reminded her too much of everything she had lost.

She cautiously shifted Ariana's position from Aberforth's shoulder to her own without saying a word. Ariana melted into her, as if she belonged there in the crease of her neck and shoulder.

The sobbing slowly faded. Just like the past. And finally, it was gone, and all that remained was the lost red blue eyes of the present.

There were a few minutes of silence before Kendra realized that there was another pair of blue eyes staring at her, brighter, wider. She couldn't escape them. Albus was watching her from the floor, his head turned around, only visible from his nose up. Kendra wasn't sure when he had woken, but their eyes met and she glimpsed his bright, bright eyes, sparkle still intact. She glanced away.

"Mum?"

She glanced up at what she could see of his face again, his eyes. The shadows that crossed his face reminded her of Azkaban. He looked so much like his father.

"What is it, Albus?" she whispered as her arms tightened around Ariana.

He didn't answer right away. She waited.

"Where did you go tonight?"

It was her turn to not answer right away. Should she tell him? Was he old enough to know? He was still so young. But, could she really keep him from growing up by keeping this information from him? It was already too late. She could see it in his eyes. He had already grown up. She didn't know when that had happened. But, nevertheless, it had. There was no going back now.

"I went to see your father," she breathed, hoping that by barely saying it aloud, the action would disappear. It was the last time she would ever see him. Shame flooded her body. She had killed Percival. It was her own fault that she would never see him again. It was her fault that he would die, locked away in that dark prison, never seeing his children again. All her fault. She had killed the father of her own children. The thought was unbearable.

"In—In Azkaban?" Albus murmured.

She nodded as she stroked Ariana's long, tangled hair.

"He isn't coming back, is he?" Albus asked, slightly louder, his voice cracking.

Kendra marveled at the maturity in his tone. So young, he was. He didn't deserve this. He didn't deserve a mother as selfish as she was. He would never understand her choice. Even she didn't understand it.

But Albus was right. The facts were the facts. And he was right.

She shook her head, "No…no, he's not, Albus."

They sat in silence for what seemed like hours, drifting in and out of slumber. The sun still hadn't reached the horizon when Albus whispered, "What are we going to do without him?"

It was the very question that Kendra had been forcing herself not to answer. She didn't know the answer. And if she did, she didn't want to think about it. Because life without Percival would not be easy. Life without Percival meant three fatherless children and an empty bed every night. She didn't know if she was strong enough to live through his constant absence, knowing that she was the one who had created it.

She was afraid to confess this to Albus. So afraid. What would he think of her? She couldn't disappoint him.

But she already had.

She didn't want to answer his question.

And she didn't have to.

At that moment Ariana began to stir in Kendra's arms, twisting her tiny fingers away from her mother's neck and swatting the long, stray pieces of golden hair out of her face.

She opened her eyes. Two lost oceans.

Her eyes darted around the room, finally resting on Kendra. She looked confused, the oceans storming, flecking with lightning and monstrous waves.

Ariana didn't recognize her. Kendra felt her heart shrink and shrivel. It wasn't fair. Ariana was hers. Kendra had created her. She had given her life. Ariana belonged to her. But the life she had given was gone. Now, she didn't belong to anyone. She belonged to the sea in her eyes, those two slipping, shifting oceans.

Ariana mouthed something indecipherable, barely any noise escaping her lips.

Kendra's heart was beating furiously.

"What is it, Ariana?" Kendra asked, lovingly tucking a lock of hair behind Ariana's ear, trying to forget about everything, trying to treat her just as she would have before.

Ariana looked away. Her eyes found Albus, still only half visible from the floor. They wandered back to Kendra.

"I'm hungry."

ooo

The next few days seemed to pass in a blur of sleeping and waking, tears always alarmingly close to the surface for all. Kendra seemed to move as if sleepwalking, always disconcerted and confused, often losing her train of thought, forgetting where she was or what she was doing. She felt like she was missing something, but she didn't know what. And everything around her was still steadily falling apart, her life was scattered in pieces at her feet.

Four days had passed since that fateful day when everything seemed to be perfect, and then it all seemed to disappear before her eyes. She could scarcely even remember what her life had been like before then. Four days. Could that really be all? It felt like so much longer. Four months. Four years. Four decades. Four centuries, maybe. But not four days.

Everything was out of place, in the kitchen, in the hall, in the yard, in the bedrooms. It all seemed somewhat foreign. She wandered from room to room without purpose, seeming to survey the unfamiliarity, not knowing where to go, what to do. It was almost as if she was the one who had lost her sanity, not her daughter. With Percival missing, there were a family without any unity; they were barely a family at all.

But this is what she had wanted, wasn't it? Maybe. In theory. But without Percival, Kendra felt as if she was slowly going insane.

No.

She mustn't think things like that anymore. It wasn't a saying that should be thrown around in her head. It wasn't right to think that.

The neighbors had been talking. Kendra could practically hear their ill-concealed whispers floating through every window and crack in the walls. The rumors…they were everywhere, she couldn't escape them. They seemed to surround her like an impenetrable sphere of uncertainty. She hadn't answered the door. She hadn't answered the owls. She hadn't answered the various voices coming from the fireplace downstairs, calling her name, the children's names, she let them continue in vain…the last thing she needed was a fresh batch of tears.

She was coping, but only just. If coping meant that she hadn't yet collapsed into another fit of steady, salty tears. She felt as if she was merely dragging herself along through the day, second by second, telling herself that things couldn't get any worse than they already were. But she kept being unexpectedly distracted.

Ariana was gone. She was still there in the physical sense of the word, but Ariana, her daughter, the girl who had once laughed and danced, the Ariana she knew, she was gone. She didn't seem to recognize them, neither her mother nor her brothers. She treated them like strangers. And her eyes were still that eerie empty shade of blue that reminded Kendra of two lost oceans. It tore Kendra's heart into a million pieces just thinking that her daughter's eyes would never again be the blue of a cloudless sky, but that now they would always be oceans.

The most unusual thing about the situation was that Ariana didn't seem to have anything that was physically wrong with her. She still looked the same, aside from her eyes of course; she could still walk and talk when she wanted to. But everything about her, her whole air and aura, had changed. It felt as if some strange and unfamiliar child or demon or creature had invaded her body and taken over, leaving nothing but the outer shell intact.

There were times when she seemed almost close to ordinary, somewhat alert and observant, a flicker of her old self glimpsed for a moment, but disappearing before the observer could notice it. But her eyes were still that disconcerting blue, no matter how much she seemed to be her old self.

She had rarely spoken, and when she did it was usually muttering in her sleep, the same words over and over, denying what she was by nature: "I'm not a witch…I'm not a witch."

She hadn't done any conscious magic either, or even unconscious magic. She seemed to be holding it back, hiding it, like a deadly squirming something locked away inside, dying to be released but being held back by all the free will Ariana could muster. Kendra knew what would happen sooner or later. Her daughter was too magical, too powerful at such a young age for it not to happen. It would have to explode out of her if she didn't let it go of her own accord.

Kendra hadn't even let the boys go near her, though she suspected that Aberforth had crept into Ariana's room during the night at least once every night so far; she had heard his carefully treading footsteps in the dead of night, tiptoeing across the creaking floorboards, trying not to be heard. But she hadn't had the courage to tell him to go back to bed, because truthfully, she couldn't help looking either. When she could gaze at the ceiling no longer, when she lost control and couldn't bear the uncertainty, when she could no longer endure the dark nights alone in the empty bed in which she attempted to sleep, she tiptoed just as Aberforth did. She crept across the creaking floorboards by the light of the moon streaming in milky beams through the windows. And she just watched…and thought. She watched her broken angel sleep. And she thought about how this simultaneous miracle and tragedy of a little girl had both held her family together and effortlessly allowed it to crumble to pieces. She wanted to scream…or cry, she never could decide anymore.

But she never spoke aloud, never uttered a single syllable, fearful that the angelic, sleeping form would wake and there in front of her again would be those lost eyes. So she allowed Aberforth to watch as she watched, but she prayed he would never speak. A simple word, a tone of voice, a gesture, it could set her off and Kendra knew it. The magic was just waiting inside her, ready to explode at any moment. Kendra could see it clear as day in the swirling, crashing waves of those two lost oceans. It was coming.


End file.
